Charges will not be filed against three St. Paul police officers who shot and killed a woman who pointed a gun at them while they were responding to reports of a suicide in progress, Ramsey County prosecutors said.
The Ramsey County Attorney’s Office announced on Monday that three officers — Chiking Chazonkhueze, Chee Lao and Yengkong Lor — were justified in firing their handguns and fatally shooting Pepsi Lee Heinl, 41, of St. Paul.
An obituary for Heinl says her last name was Benjamin.
The decision comes nearly a year after the May 6, 2024, shooting, which took place inside a home in the 1100 block of Rose Avenue E. in St. Paul. After reviewing the prosecutors’ 26-page memo, which considered the findings by the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension’s investigation, County Attorney John Choi wrote in a letter that there was “no other reasonable choice to do something different under these circumstances.”
“We all wish there could have been a different outcome that did not have to involve the use of deadly force and with Pepsi Lee Heinl losing her life,” Choi said.
Her mother told investigators she was doing dishes when she heard gurgling sounds and ran to see Heinl unconscious on the floor. The mother began chest compressions, and Heinl regained consciousness. She guessed that Heinl may have overdosed on a medication that her mother was taking.
She also provided investigators with a 30-page journal entry signed by Heinl expressing suicidal ideations, the memo says.
According to a 911 transcript, the mother told dispatchers: “My daughter is committing suicide! Hurry, please!” before hanging up. A compilation of body camera footage from each of the officers shows them entering the house just before 7:30 p.m. and announcing their presence before they are called to a back room by Heinl’s mother, who frantically tells them: “She was turning blue on her mouth and she wasn’t breathing!”
