Rainbow Foods Worker Stabbed by Customer
A 48-year-old Rainbow Foods workers is recovering after he was stabbed in the chest by a customer around noon Monday at the grocery store. Investigators believe a 67-year-old became upset while trying to buy his groceries in the checkout lane. He began yelling and swearing and was asked to leave the store by an employee.
While the employee and the man were walking toward the exit, the man suddenly stabbed the employee once in the chest with a folding pocket knife. A store security officer then tackled the man and detained him until officers arrived.
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Angry customer at Midway Rainbow Foods stabbed manager suddenly
The St. Paul grocery store manager was trying to calm the screaming 67-year-old customer before the customer stabbed him Monday, a witness said today.
"I heard him say, 'It will be OK, we'll figure it out,' " said Cynthia McArthur, who was shopping at the Midway Rainbow Foods when the employee was injured. "He very quietly said, 'Let's talk over here' and it seemed like he was trying to de-escalate the situation."
Suddenly, it appeared the customer had punched the manager, McArthur said. It turned out that the 48-year-old man had been stabbed. McArthur said she saw blood on the white shirt of the man, who remained conscious.
An ambulance whisked him away. Police have said the employee was stabbed once in the chest with a folding pocketknife, and that his injuries were not life threatening.
A store security guard "had the guy separated and down on the ground instantly," McArthur said. Police arrested Russell Terry Johnson on suspicion of aggravated assault. The Ramsey County attorney's office is reviewing the case for charges today, and Johnson remains jailed.
Johnson was convicted in a 1966 St. Paul murder, and of shooting two people in St. Paul in 1982. He's been out of prison since 1991 and hasn't had much of a criminal record since then.
But from appearances alone, Johnson "looked like a nice guy," McArthur said. "He looked like an older gentleman - gray hair, wearing a vest." When he started shouting, she said, "I actually looked around for some
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other people who might be shouting" because she was so surprised it would be him.
It was about noon Monday at the Rainbow at 1566 University Ave., and McArthur said she had just stopped a man walking by and asked if he was a manager. The man, who would turn out to be the victim, said "yes" and she asked him about a product.
At the self-check out lanes, McArthur saw the suspect. The pin number for his debit card apparently didn't work and he'd gone over to the cashier who offers help for those lanes, said McArthur, of St. Paul.
"He started yelling at the cashier," she said. "She was crying, and the manager came and took it over."
That's when the manager tried to calm Johnson and the stabbing occurred, McArthur said.
"We were all in shock because it had happened so quickly," she said. "It was so frightening. I think my adrenaline was up for a couple of hours."
McArthur said she called the store this morning to ask how the manager was doing. She was told he wanted to come back to work today, but the company had told him to wait until later in the week.
McArthur said she's been shopping at the Midway Rainbow for at least 10 years and has never felt unsafe there. "I was really impressed Monday with how quickly they got it under control," she said.
On Sunday, McArthur had gone to a healing ceremony during the Dalai Lama's visit at the University of Minnesota.
"He was talking about how people can chose to go on a path of not doing misery to others, and doing kind and compassionate things," she said. "I was thinking, this guy (the suspect) wasn't on that path. The irony of it all struck me."
In 1966, Johnson shot a 26-year-old man who'd recently returned from the Vietnam War in a St. Paul bar. He was sentenced to up to 25 years in prison. Johnson was paroled in 1972 and discharged from parole in 1976, according to the Minnesota Corrections Department.
In 1982, Johnson shot two people who were trying to repossess his car in front of his St. Paul home. One had puncture wounds to his leg; the other had a superficial wound to his ankle. Sentenced in 1986, Johnson was released from prison in 1991.
Since then, Johnson was convicted of theft by check in 1996 and of having no driver's license in his possession in 1999.