‘Should never have been charged’: Jury finds ex-Minn. father not guilty after son fell out window, died

The attorney of a former Twin Cities man who was found not guilty of second-degree manslaughter in the death of his 3-year-old son blamed the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office for charging him in the first place.

“He was an innocent man,” attorney Peter Wold said of Saleban Duale, 30, of Irving, Texas. “It was tragedy upon tragedy that he endured. It was oppressive, to take [the loss of his child] and not even allow him to grieve.”

Duale’s son, Aa’lim Ali, fell out of an eighth-story window in a Brooklyn Center apartment building last year and died. The apartment belonged to Duale’s brother. A jury found Duale not guilty last week after a five-day trial in Hennepin County District Court.

Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said it was unquestionably the right decision to press charges in the case, even if the verdict went against her office and veteran prosecutor Dan Allard.

“This is a negligence case, there’s nothing intentional here,” Moriarty said about charging Duale. “It can be very difficult to decide was this just an accident or was what happened here, and this is the standard, reasonably foreseeable.”

The defense argued that Duale had been letting his older children play PlayStation 5 while his two younger children, including Aa’lim, had been given controllers that were not connected so they could pretend to play and that Duale was with them “the whole time.” Later the two youngest children watched some YouTube videos in his room before their screen time was up. The defense also argued that Duale’s brother had cracked the screen on the window the night before.

Duale was packing bags to leave the apartment building when one of his children yelled that Aa’lim had jumped out the window onto the balcony. Duale knew there was no balcony attached to the apartment. He ran out to see his son on the pavement below. He raced eight floors down and jumped a fence to try and render aid. He then called his sister, who is a doctor, before police arrived.

Moriarty said a 3-year-old child pushing against a screen eight stories high in an apartment building and then falling from that window felt like a reasonably foreseeable outcome. But she also said there’s a difference between that feeling and proving it beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury.

Wold said state child protection looked into the death and found no grounds for negligence. “Why it gets charged is beyond me,” he said.

Duale shared five children with his ex-wife and his visitation was limited to once every three weeks. He had traveled from Texas, where he was living.

Police photos showed a couch was pushed up directly beneath the window of the apartment and court documents indicate that Aa’lim had been playing on the back of the couch before he fell. Duale’s oldest child, who is 9, said Duale had been “on the phone all day” and didn’t see Aa’lim fall, while another child, who was 8, said Duale was “lying on a bed in his bedroom” when Aa’lim fell out of the window. A police officer also said Duale told them he was sleeping when his son fell out the window.

“A total lie. A total lie. And he knew he was lying,” Wold said of the police officer, adding that at trial they showed body camera footage where the police officer spoke with Duale and Duale never said he was sleeping.

Wold said the allegations made by the children, who showed up at trial, were a fabrication and indicated that leading questions from adults in positions of authority may have pressed them to report that their father was on the phone or sleeping that morning.

Moriarty pushed against that claim.

“There were four children who made various statements but they were very consistent that dad was not in the room,” Moriarty said. “That’s why this is hard. You look at [the evidence], you look at the statements of the kids.”

She said when her attorneys brought her the case, they said it could be tough to prove, but she agreed with them and signed off on it. Moriarty said, even after losing at trial, she thought the charge was appropriate. She also noted that her office had offered Duale probation before trial and this was about trying to get Duale to take accountability.

The jury deliberated for a little over three hours before returning the not guilty verdict. Wold said it’s hard to tell how a jury will approach a verdict, but he felt a huge sense of relief for his client, who was supported throughout by friends and family members.

“It was a scary case,” Wold said. “That case should never have been charged.”