A 52-year-old man murdered a 17-year-old boy and wounded four people during a stabbing rampage Saturday.
The incident occurred in the afternoon while the Minnesota man and his victims were tubing on the Apple River in Wisconsin.
The slain teenager also hailed from Minnesota, according to WITI-TV.
The man left the scene after his knife attack. However, witnesses later spotted him at a place where those tubing on the river exit, the New York Times reported.
Police subsequently arrested the attacker and took him into custody.
The man is currently held, pending charges, at the St. Croix County Jail, Sheriff Scott Knudson of the St. Croix County Sheriff’s Office said, according to WITI.
Authorities did not release the names of the killer or his victims, the Times reported. Police have still not determined the man’s motive.
NEW: St. Croix County Sheriff’s Office says the 17-year-old boy killed in the Apple River stabbings was from Stillwater.
Other four victims include:
Male, 20, Luck, WI
Male, 22, Luck, WI
Female, 24, Burnsville, MN
Male, 22, Elk River, MNAll are stable in the hospital. @WCCO pic.twitter.com/kfN5Mv7y32
— Kirsten Mitchell (@Kirsten_TV) July 31, 2022
The four people the assailant injured included one woman and three men — all in their early 20s, according to reporting from WITI.
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The wounded suffered stab wounds in their torsos, among other injuries. They are in critical condition, according to the Times.
Police began receiving reports of the stabbings at around 3:45 p.m. that day. When emergency workers arrived at the scene, they found five wounded people and the suspect missing, WITI reported.
The incident occurred near milepost nine on Highway 3564 — located near Sunrise Bridge and what used to be Sunrise Park.
According to Knudson, the stabbing occurred in an area hard to reach by road. Deputies had to wade through waist-level water for approximately 100 yards before they could reach the victims, Knudson said, according to the Times.
Other tubers helped emergency personnel with administering first aid to the victims.
Emergency responders airlifted two victims to Regions Hospital, while the others were taken to the hospital by ambulance. The 17-year-old boy was hospitalized at Lakeview Hospital, where he was pronounced dead, according to WITI.
Knudson, according to the news station, described the scene as “chaotic” and “scary,” adding that “anybody that witnessed this will never forget it.”
“I have not seen anything like this to this extent,” Knudson said of the knife attack.
Somerset — the location of the stabbing site — is a village 35 miles northeast of Minneapolis, where tubing is a “main attraction.”
