A St. Paul teen has admitted to the robbery and fatal shooting of a 24-year-old in St. Paul’s Frogtown neighborhood nearly two years ago, and will be sentenced next month to 16½ years in prison as part of a plea agreement.

Daeshon Lee Tucker, 18, pleaded guilty in Ramsey County District Court on Thursday to second-degree unintentional murder while committing a felony in the Oct. 11, 2022, killing of Marcus Darnell Miller of St. Paul. An autopsy showed Miller died of blood loss from a gunshot wound to his back. Tucker was 16 at the time of the shooting and certified to stand trial as an adult in January.

Daeshon Lee Tucker (Courtesy of the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office)

He entered the guilty plea four days before a jury trial was scheduled to start. It includes the length of the prison term, which is the top of the Minnesota state sentencing guidelines, and the dismissal of a second-degree intentional murder charge at sentencing, which is scheduled for Nov. 18.

According to the criminal complaint:

St. Paul police officers were dispatched to the area of Thomas Avenue and Grotto Street around 6:35 p.m. after reports of 15 to 20 gunshots fired and a male shot. They found Miller wounded and lying next to his SUV. He was slipping in and out of consciousness, and pronounced dead at Regions Hospital.

Miller’s girlfriend told police that she and Miller were walking in the 700 block of Thomas Avenue when a vehicle occupied by two young Black males wearing face masks cut them off by driving over the sidewalk. Both had handguns. She ran to Miller’s SUV that was parked nearby and hid, while the passenger searched Miller’s pockets and the driver did “all the talking,” the complaint states.

At some point, she told police, the driver started shooting toward Miller. When he ran away, both the driver and passenger continued shooting at him. Miller fell to the ground twice as he fled until he ultimately collapsed next to his SUV. The two male suspects returned to their vehicle and fled east through an alley.

Witnesses reported seeing a dark blue Kia SUV stop Miller near the northeast alley of Grotto Street and two males in ski masks rob him. They said they saw the males shoot Miller in the back as he ran. Officers located 20 9mm shell casings.

Police used surveillance footage from the area to gather the first two letters of the SUV’s Minnesota license plate. They learned a blue Kia Sportage had been reported as stolen from Minneapolis Community and Technical College just after 5 p.m. that day.

Officers on Oct. 13 recovered the SUV parked in the 900 block of Albemarle Street. The forensics unit processed the car and recovered Tucker’s palm print on the exterior rear passenger door, according to the complaint.

Officers located Tucker’s Facebook page, which featured photos of him wearing a light tan colored DARE sweatshirt that was consistent with the one worn by a shooter. Six days after the killing, Tucker posted, “He tried ta run and he tripped,” with an emoji resembling a ninja assassin. “This description is consistent with Miller’s movements as he tried to escape from the shooters,” the petition states.

Tucker was arrested Nov. 2 after fleeing police in a motor vehicle. He agreed to speak with homicide investigators, saying on the day of the shooting he’d been in Minneapolis at a family gathering and at a cousin’s house. He refused to give police his mother’s name or his cousin’s name to verify his story. After police refused to show him more surveillance photos they had gathered of the suspects, Tucker stopped the interview.

A Ramsey County Attorney’s Office spokesman said Friday that charges have not been filed against the other alleged shooter.

Earlier shooting

Less than two months before Miller’s killing, Tucker shot and wounded a 15-year-old girl and an 18-year-old man on the Western Avenue Green Line light-rail platform in St. Paul, charges allege. Video surveillance shows Tucker firing a chrome handgun on Aug. 29, 2022, and three witnesses later identified him as the shooter, according to a criminal complaint in that case charging him with two counts of second-degree assault.

Forensic examinations showed shell casings recovered from both crime scenes matched, the complaint says.

Tucker was also certified to stand trial as an adult in that case, which remains open.

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