Man who admitted to shooting man in the head with shotgun pleads guilty to 1st-degree assault

By KSTP

Michael Alexander Credit: Hennepin County Jail

A man who was arrested after he admitted to shooting another man in the head while the victim was asleep with a baby in the room entered a guilty plea on Monday.

Michael Eugene Detroy Alexander, 20, pleaded guilty to first-degree assault for shooting his sister’s boyfriend in the head with a shotgun in March last year.

The victim was taken to the hospital in critical condition but survived.

Alexander was initially charged with second-degree attempted murder and first-degree assault.

According to a criminal complaint, officers responded to a reported shooting just before 3:30 a.m. on March 8, 2022, at 23rd Avenue Northeast and Jefferson Street Northeast and found Alexander carrying a box containing a shotgun. Police also found two used and two unused shotgun shells after searching him.

The criminal complaint shows that Alexander told investigators “he had a feeling that his family and [the victim] were out to get him” and admitted to shooting at the victim twice while he was in bed.

The petition to enter a guilty plea shows that Alexander has been a patient at a mental hospital in the past and that he has suffered from a nervous or mental condition.

Alexander’s sister told police she and her boyfriend were sleeping when she heard two shots and the victim screamed after the second shot. Their 1-year-old child was “sleeping only feet away from them” at the time of the shooting.

Alexander’s sentencing date is set for June 8 at 9 a.m.

He faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.