MINNEAPOLIS – A north Minneapolis man has been charged related to a horrific high-speed crash in Robbinsdale over the weekend that took the life of a young mother of two and severely injured her husband.
Emily Gerding was killed in the crash and her husband, John, remains hospitalized with injuries following the Saturday evening crash just after 8 p.m.
Quintin Leon Hudson, 20, has been charged with felony counts of fleeing police that results in death, fleeing police that results in great bodily harm, criminal vehicular homicide involving operation of a vehicle in a grossly negligent manner, and criminal vehicular operation that results in great bodily harm.
According to the charging document and comments in a weekend press conference by Robbinsdale Police Captain John Elder, an officer observed a vehicle on 42nd Avenue North traveling at a high rate of speed clocked at that time at 54-55 mph.
The officer turned around and tried to catch up to the vehicle in an attempt to stop the vehicle after noting the license plate and the lone masked occupant of the vehicle.
The vehicle made numerous turns in an attempt to evade police, Elder said. The officer came into view of the Tesla at 40th and Orchard Avenue North and the vehicle took off. The squad activated the squad lights and siren and the Tesla accelerated rapidly and pulled away from the officer.
One block later, Elder said that the squad turned off the lights and siren and disengaged from the suspect vehicle. A video clip posted in the Facebook group Birdtown Crime Watch & Information captured the fleeing vehicle prior to the crash on Orchard Avenue with the squad car trailing a distance behind.
Elder said the officer then observed from a few blocks away that a crash had occurred at 36th and Orchard avenues. The officer estimated at that time that the suspect vehicle had been traveling about 70-90 mph. The suspect was taken into custody at the scene and responders tended to the victims in the minivan.
Robbinsdale crash scene (Birdtown Crime Watch & Information/Facebook)
CPR was performed on Emily, and she was transported to the hospital but died as a result of her injuries. John was transported to the hospital in critical condition.
Hudson was also briefly hospitalized for non-life threatening injuries before he was eventually booked into custody at Hennepin County Jail, Elder said.
Elder noted that the Tesla was not a stolen vehicle. Law enforcement later located $4,000 in cash inside the Tesla along with credit and debit cards in names of people other than Hudson or the renter of the Tesla. The complaint noted that Hudson was not the party who rented the Tesla, but the renter’s name was not disclosed in the complaint.
Minnesota court records show that Hudson was in court in March of this year where a misdemeanor charge of driving without a valid license was continued for dismissal under an agreement offered by the St. Louis Park city attorney to suspend prosecution. The agreement specified that prosecution would be suspended for one year if Hudson remained clear of any same or similar driving violations. Hudson was placed on unsupervised monitoring without a conviction in the case.
Hudson is being held on $500,000 bail on the new charges and is scheduled to make his first court appearance on the charges on Thursday.
Friends of the Gerding family have set up a GoFundMe that has raised over $168,000 so far to cover funeral and medical expenses as well as future needs for the couple’s two daughters who are ages six and three. The girls were not in the vehicle with the couple at the time of the crash.
Media sources have reported that both Emily and John, both age 34, were special-education teachers at Coon Rapids Middle School.
Minnesota Crime Watch & Information publishes news, info and commentary about crime, public safety and livability issues in Minneapolis, the Twin Cities and Greater Minnesota.
This article originally appeared at Alpha News and was reprinted with permission.
