MINNEAPOLIS — The way the deadly encounter is laid out by prosecutors in the criminal complaint sounds like they believe 15-year-old Deshaun Hill may have been murdered simply for brushing shoulders with a man whose path he crossed on a sidewalk north of Golden Valley Road near Penn Avenue in Minneapolis.
The man charged with 2nd-degree murder is Cody Fohrenkam, a 29-year-old listed with a Minneapolis address.
But his mother tells KARE 11 for the last nine months, he's been homeless, staying with people — sometimes in Minneapolis, sometimes with her on the Fond du Lac Indian Reservation in Carlton County.
Fohrenkam's criminal history includes an arson conviction in 2012. A Pine Journal Newspaper article says Fohrenkam was accused of pouring gas on the porch of a home in Cloquet with people living inside and proceeding to light it on fire.
But Fohrenkam's first felony came two years earlier when he was convicted at age 19 of possessing a sawed-off shotgun in Minneapolis.
Since that is a felony crime of violence, from that day forward, Fohrenkam was barred from having guns.
Fohrenkam's mother tells KARE 11 her son has been more law abiding in recent years, despite pending misdemeanor assault charges.
Fohrenkam's alibi that he gave his mother for the day of Hill's shooting is the same one he initially gave police: He was in Wisconsin when the crime occurred.
The criminal complaint says he later changed his story and admitted to being in the corner store right across the street from the murder scene.
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