A fatal shooting on the Green Line in Minneapolis left one man dead and a monthlong investigation in motion. Now prosecutors say a mix of video, transit records, witness accounts, and DNA evidence led them to a suspect.
What happened on the Green Line
Officers responded just after 9 p.m. on Oct. 3 to a report of a shooting on a Green Line train in Minneapolis. They found 36-year-old Joseph Denny Nezperce of South St. Paul in the rear-most seat of the light-rail car, according to the criminal charges. Nezperce had been shot 3 times and later died from a gunshot wound to the neck.
Investigators say the suspect, 30-year-old Jaquan Darrian Edwards, boarded an eastbound Green Line train after being seen at the U.S. Bank Stadium station about 13 minutes before the shooting. Surveillance video described in the charges showed him sitting in the rear-most seat. Nezperce then boarded at Stadium Village Station and sat across from him.
Video from inside the train captured a dialogue between the 2 men before 3 shots were fired, according to the charges. After the shooting, investigators say Edwards got off at Prospect Park Station. Cameras in the area then recorded him walking away from the platform, removing and replacing a Covid mask, and repeatedly looking back over his shoulder.
How investigators followed the DNA trail
One of the most striking details in the case is what police collected before the shooting even happened. According to the charges, surveillance video showed Edwards spitting “voluminously” on the platform at the U.S. Bank Stadium station. Minneapolis police collected the saliva and later developed a DNA profile from it.
Investigators also reviewed bus card activity and learned the same person had swiped a transit card several times between Sept. 22 and Oct. 3. That led them to video from a Sept. 22 bus trip in Maplewood. From there, police tracked video of the man entering a grocery store and then an Advanced Auto Parts store.
A security staff member at the grocery store told investigators the man worked at the auto parts store, according to the charges. Employee records then identified him as Edwards. On Oct. 20, investigators searched trash at Edwards’ mother’s home and recovered 6 wood cigar mouthpieces, which were tested and matched the DNA profile from the station saliva.
Arrest, charges, and what comes next
The investigation also tied into an earlier police contact from July. White Bear Lake police had stopped Edwards during a traffic stop while he was driving a car belonging to his mother and smoking a wood-tipped cigar, according to the charges. Investigators later spoke with a witness who knew Edwards and said he lived with his mother.
Police arrested Edwards over the weekend, nearly 1 month after the Oct. 3 shooting. He was scheduled to make his first appearance Monday afternoon in Hennepin County District Court. Prosecutors charged him with intentional second-degree murder.
Edwards remained jailed in lieu of $1 million bail. If convicted, he faces up to 40 years in prison. The case stands out because investigators say a trail of small pieces of evidence, from train video to discarded cigar tips, helped identify a suspect in a killing on one of the Twin Cities’ busiest transit lines.
