Court orders new trial for man convicted of attempted murder at Brooklyn Park gas station

A man who was convicted and sentenced for shooting at a Brooklyn Park gas station in 2021 should get a new trial, an appeals court ruled Monday.

The Minnesota Court of Appeals cited “several errors” during Daryl Shannon Williams’ trial in reversing his conviction and ordering a new trial.

Police found a man suffering from multiple gunshot wounds in an SUV parked in front of a Speedway gas station in the 7500 block of Brooklyn Boulevard on Nov. 20, 2021. Before the victim was taken to a hospital, he told officers he was shot by someone he knew as “Joker.”

The victim was seriously injured, had 11 gunshot wounds and underwent several surgeries but survived.

Williams was charged with attempted second-degree murder, convicted and sentenced to nearly 13 years in prison in the summer of 2022. However, he argued that there were several evidentiary errors during his trial.

His lawyer noted that the victim later told officers that he wasn’t sure who shot him and didn’t even want to prosecute the suspect. But he was still at the hospital at that time and was heavily sedated, so the court didn’t allow that evidence.

While the Court of Appeals agreed with that decision, it also agreed with Williams that his Confrontation Clause rights were violated because the victim was never called to testify and also ruled that a lead detective’s statements that Williams was the shooter were improper. Additionally, the court should’ve allowed the statements the victim made minutes after the shooting, which Williams intended to use to show the victim identified someone else as the shooter.

“We conclude the identified errors collectively deprived Williams of a fair trial,” Judge Elise Larson wrote in the court’s opinion, noting that the only remaining evidence to identify him as the shooter was dark security camera video.