A 60-year-old man faces three felony charges after allegedly firing a gun and threatening to shoot law enforcement officers during a six-hour standoff earlier this week at a Babbitt motel.
Stephen Michael Nagel of Babbitt was arrested Wednesday and charged Friday with second-degree assault, threats of violence and reckless discharge of a firearm within a municipality. If convicted on the most serious charge, he faces up to seven years in prison and a $14,000 fine.
Nagel appeared in State District Court in Virginia on Friday, where bail was set at $20,000. He remained in the St. Louis County Jail as of Friday night.
According to the criminal complaint and police reports:
The Babbitt Police Department was called late Tuesday to a disturbance at the Alder Inn after a man - identified as Nagel - called dispatch and threatened to shoot people.
ADVERTISEMENT
Two responding officers heard yelling and swearing from Nagel's room. After one officer knocked on the door, "both officers heard the sound of a round getting racked into the action of a firearm," the complaint states.
Both officers backed down the hall for cover, and the other motel residents were evacuated.
After officers from other agencies arrived, they tried to talk with Nagel by phone. Nagel allegedly told them that he would "shoot anyone that tried to come through the door," that "he had a year to live so he did not care what happened," and that the police had "screwed him over 15 years ago," the complaint states.
At one point while officers were trying to talk with Nagel, he fired a shot from inside his room, the complaint alleges.
The St. Louis County Sheriff's Office Emergency Response Team was called, and eventually put a camera through the window of Nagel's room and determined that he was in the bathroom. Deputies entered the room and took him into custody. The standoff lasted about six hours, Babbitt police reported.
Officers later executed a search warrant and found four firearms in the room, the complaint states.
Online court records do not show any prior convictions for Nagel in the state of Minnesota. He is due back in court on Wednesday.
