A year in the Ramsey County workhouse is the sentence for a man who claimed self-defense and fatally stabbed another man during a dispute in St. Paul over a parking spot.
Brian Kjellberg, 51, of St. Paul was sentenced Wednesday in Ramsey County District Court after jurors convicted him of second-degree unintentional murder in the attack on 27-year-old Arnell Jermel "AJ" Stewart on Dec. 2, 2021, with a sharpened quarter-inch metal pipe in the 1700 block of E. 7th Street.
Judge Leonardo Castro departed from state sentencing guidelines and set aside a 12½-year term for Kjellberg in favor of the workhouse.
Castro also put Kjellberg on probation for 10 years and ordered him to perform hundreds of hours of community service. The judge also fined him $5,000 and directed him to pay more than $8,200 to the Minnesota Crime Victims Reparations Program.
Before sentencing, defense attorney Earl Gray appealed in writing for his client to be spared prison. Gray cited Kjellberg's lack of a criminal record, five years in the Navy, health difficulties and being amenable to probation.
Dennis Gerhardstein, spokesman for the County Attorney's Office, said Thursday that prosecutors and probation officials argued for the 12½-year sentence.
"As painful as it is for us to see the victims in this case not get the justice they wanted, we must accept the judge's decision because it his decision alone to make," Gerhardstein said. "Our hearts go out to the family and friends of Arnell Jermel Stewart, who lost his life to a senseless act of violence."
According to the complaint against Kjellberg:
Officers responded to the stabbing just before 8 p.m. after Kjellberg had called 911. He said a man had blocked Kjellberg's driveway with his Mercedes SUV and was trying to move it. Kjellberg told the dispatcher he refused to let the man do it..
Instead, Kjellberg had called to have the SUV ticketed and was waiting for a tow truck to pick it up.
Kjellberg told investigators Stewart rushed him and punched him several times in the face. He said he feared for his safety and in self-defense stabbed Stewart in the chest with the sharpened pipe. Stewart, of St. Paul, died that day at Regions Hospital.
When investigators asked Kjellberg why he didn't just let Stewart take the car, Kjellberg said he wanted it ticketed and towed so the problem wouldn't reoccur.
"Kjellberg emphasized that it was his property, and he was tired of dealing with the parking problems," the complaint said.
