As many as 17 gunshots could be heard over a 35-second period as a St. Paul police officer was fired upon, according to an attempted murder charge filed Wednesday.

A St. Paul man is accused of shooting through his car window at a pursuing officer with an AR-style rifle on Monday night. The number of shots was counted from the officer’s squad video, the criminal complaint said.

Police Chief Axel Henry said Tuesday that the officer and community members are “unbelievably lucky” they weren’t injured by the actions of Samuel Cal Flowers, 26, in the Summit-University area.

Samuel Cal Flowers (Courtesy of the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office)

As St. Paul Officer Abdirahman Dahir tried to pull over the driver, identified as Flowers, the officer saw muzzle flashes from the Chevrolet Impala’s interior. He heard gunshots and saw the Impala’s rear window break out. Dahir backed off to try to avoid rounds while keeping an eye on the Impala, according to a criminal complaint.

Dahir’s squad had a flat front passenger tire. A bullet fragment was later recovered from it.

Officers pursued the Impala, which Flowers crashed into a parked vehicle on Fuller Avenue near Victoria Street, and arrested Flowers.

Police found a Ruger AR-556 without a stock on the front passenger seat of the Impala, and 14 spent .223 casings from around the Impala’s interior.

The Ruger had a round of .223 caliber armor-piercing ammunition in its chamber and two additional armor-piercing rounds in its magazine. The rifle was reported stolen in 2018 in Minneapolis.

Charges: From traffic stop to shots fired

The incident began about 11 p.m. Monday when an officer working a DWI and traffic detail saw a Chevrolet Impala going 47 mph in a 30-mph zone on University Avenue. The officer followed and turned on his squad’s emergency lights before Victoria Street on Central Avenue. The driver kept going, driving through stop signs and accelerating, the complaint said.

Officer Dahir got behind the car and followed, but lost sight of it until he saw fresh snowy tire tracks in an alley between Fuller and Central avenues. The driver kept fleeing. On St. Anthony Avenue, when Dahir was about 60 yards behind the Impala, the gunfire began.

After Flowers crashed, he reached around inside the car toward the passenger seat before exiting with his hands up. Officers told him to walk back to them, but he walked toward a home and police arrested him on the side of it.

A bag that police found on Flowers later tested positive for the presence of cocaine and weighed 0.39 grams, according to the complaint.

Flowers declined to speak with investigators.

Prosecutors seeking $10M bail

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi said they were grateful that officers “responded swiftly and and were able to resolve this situation without anyone getting seriously hurt, including Mr. Flowers.”

“By choosing to flee police and actively shoot at them with a lethal weapon, Mr. Flowers significantly endangered the lives of our peace officers, community members who happened to be in the vicinity going about their daily lives, as well as his own,” Choi said in a statement. “… We will do everything in our power to hold him accountable for this egregious behavior.”

Flowers is scheduled to make his first court appearance in the case on Thursday and prosecutors plan to ask a judge to set his bail at $10 million. An attorney wasn’t listed for Flowers as of Wednesday.

In addition to attempted murder, the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office charged Flowers with:

first-degree assault by using or attempting to use deadly force against an officer,
possession of a firearm and ammunition by a person who is not eligible due to a conviction for a crime of violence,
drive-by shooting,
drug possession,
fleeing police in a motor vehicle,
refusing to submit to a chemical test of his blood or urine as required by a search warrant.

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