Anton Lazarro was a wealthy political donor who was charged in St. Paul, MN with sex trafficking. The trial took place in March, 2023. It was alleged that Lazarro paid a female friend to recruit underage girls for him to party and have sex with. In return he showered the girls with money and gifts. The government said that since he was paying money for underage sex, it qualifies as sex trafficking. The defense argued that it was not sex trafficking because the sex was consensual and the money and gifts were not connected to the sex.

Lazarro was charged with seven counts involving “commercial sex acts” with five minors in 2020. The minors were between ages 15 and 16. Lazarro was 30 years old. It only took the jury three hours to find Lazarro guilty on all counts. That might be the fastest verdict for any trial I have ever sketched. If not, its up there.

Because this case involved minors, I did not sketch any of the victims. As usual I also could not draw the jury, to protect their anonymity.

Back in 2010 Nick Firkus’s wife Heidi was shot and killed during a reported home invasion in St. Paul, MN. Firkus himself was also shot in the leg. Firkus claimed an intruder broke into his home, that he had approached the intruder with a rifle, and in the struggle the shots were fired accidentally killing his wife and injuring him.

That was the official story until May 2021 when authorities charged Firkus with shooting his wife, faking the home invasion, and shooting himself in the leg to make it look good.

I was not in court for the whole trial. I was there for opening statements, one day of testimony, and closing statements. The jury ultimately found Firkus guilty after deliberating for only a few hours.

On January 23, 2023 I sketched opening statements in the trial of Cody Fohrenkam, accused of murdering high school student Deshaun Hill, Jr.

The prosecuting attorney makes opening statements to the jury outlining why he believes Fohrenkam is guilty.

Defense attorney Lisa Skrzeczkoski-Bzdusek makes opening statements as to why she believes her client is innocent.

Testimony opened with Tuesday Sheppard, mother of the victim, testifying about the death of her son.

Witness Ashley McNamara called 911 after the murder. She was one of the first witnesses to testify, and held a Kleenex to wipe away tears.

I was only in court for opening statements on Day 1 of the trial. However, on January 26 the jury found Fohrenkam guilty.

On October 24, 2022 former Minnesota police officer J. Alexander Kueng (represented by attorney Thomas Plunkett) accepted a plea deal in the charge of aiding and abetting manslaughter in the state case against him in his role in the death of George Floyd. Kueng will serve 3-1/2 years in prison for not attempting to to stop officer Chauvin from kneeling on Floyd.

That same afternoon former officer Tou Thao (represented by attorney Robert Paule) opted to forgo another jury trial and instead chose to let Hennepin County District Judge Peter Cahill decide his guilt or innocence in the death of George Floyd using stipulated evidence. Thao insists he did nothing wrong as he attempted to stand by managing the crowd instead of intervening while his colleagues restrained a dying George Floyd. Judge Cahill has until May 1, 2023 to issue his ruling.

Thao and Kueng have already been convicted of charges in Federal court and are currently serving those sentences. These sketches were for separate state charges.

In 1993 a 35-year-old prostitute named Jeanie Ann Childs was stabbed 65 times in a south Minneapolis apartment. Her murder was a cold case for decades until DNA evidence led investigators to Jerry Westrom. Westrom’s DNA was found on bloody items in the apartment and he matched a bloody footprint from the crime scene.

Westrom’s attorney said the footprint evidence was subjective and pointed the finger at an alternate suspect, her pimp who lived in the apartment and who’s hairs were found in the victim’s hand. (That man died in 2017).

After deliberating just a few hours the jury found Westrom guilty.

I didn’t attend the entire trial. I was only there for opening and closing statements. Here is some of what I sketched:

Thomas Lane is one of the three officers who were with Derek Chauvin when George Floyd died. Lane was fairly new to police work when the Floyd incident occurred, having been working as an unsupervised officer for only four days. He twice asked to reposition Floyd but was denied by Chauvin both times. Lane also went into the ambulance to assist with CPR on Floyd.

All three officers were brought up on state charges and federal charges, which meant two trials: one in federal court and one in state court. All three officers were found guilty in the federal trial which I sketched this past February.

In the state case, Lane broke from the other two officers and decided to plead guilty. He agreed to accept a sentence for “aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter” in exchange for the state dropping the murder charge against him. As a result he was sentenced to only serve two years behind bars. He has a newborn baby, which factored into his decision to accept the plea deal rather than to risk being found guilty in trial and receiving a longer sentence.

On July 21, 2022 Lane was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in Federal court, to be served concurrently with his two-year state sentence. The sentencing lasted about an hour. I was able to crank out two sketches:

On July 6, 2021 high school baseball coach Jay Boughton was driving home from a game with his son. On the Highway 169 freeway he had a traffic altercation with another vehicle. Someone in that vehicle pulled out a gun and shot Boughton in the head, causing him to crash. Boughton died though his son survived.

For a couple of months nobody knew who the shooter was. Eventually investigators concluded the shot was fired from a vehicle rented by Jamal Smith, a man from Chicago who was traveling through Minnesota with two friends. Smith stood trial for the shooting but claims one of his passengers fried the shot.

The trial commenced last week. After hearing all the evidence the jury found him guilty of first- and second-degree murder and unlawful possession of a firearm. Smith faces a mandatory life sentence.

I was not present for the entire 7-day trial, only for select portions.

On July 7, 2022 Derek Chauvin was sentenced in federal court for the death of George Floyd. He was sentenced to 21 years in prison. The sentence will run concurrently with his state sentence of 22.5 years.

The sentencing took about an hour so I had to draw fast. I was able to work up one hi-res sketch depicting a member of the Floyd family reading a statement. I sent it to the media along with two crops, one of Chauvin and one of the Judge.

In 2021 Gregory Ulrich entered an Alina Health clinic in Buffalo, Minnesota and opened fire. He shot five people, one of whom died. He also set off two pipe bombs and a third that did not detonate. Ulrich admitted to the crime but says he is not guilty of first-degree murder because he didn’t intend to kill anyone, only to cause mayhem. He wanted to draw attention to what he saw as a heartless healthcare system by inflicting pain, not death.

Ulrich was angry about being denied opioids following a painful back surgery and says he was wrongfully labeled “drug-seeking”. On the stand Ulrich said, “I needed someone to listen…I wanted to sensationalize and get a louder message. I wanted to get in the papers and get people’s attention so people understand what pain is like without medication.” In a pre-taped video before the shooting Ulrich called on others to rise up and grab their guns. He said he was “saving all seniors” who are living in pain.

On June 3, 2022 a jury found Ulrich guilty on all counts.

I was only in court for the first day of jury selection, opening statements, and closing arguments.

The US District Court of Minnesota will be opening a new educational center soon in Minneapolis. They commissioned me to create a courtroom sketch-style illustration for use in an interactive educational display to help visitors learn about the individual roles in a courtroom. The display will have nine removable rectangle “puzzle pieces”, each highlighting a different person’s job. Visitors can take a puzzle piece from the sketch and place it in an RFID reader dock. When they do, a monitor will display information about that person’s role in court.

Above is the original illustration I completed. Below is a version showing the approximate cutout dimensions of each puzzle piece:

Once the display is finished and open to the public I hope to post some photos showing how it turned out.