Julia Li (Image via Facebook), Melvin Dump Williams (Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office)
More than a year after a Minnesota businesswoman was shot in the back of the head and killed while driving home with groceries for a dinner party, the teenager accused of murdering her at random will face charges as an adult.
Melvin Dump Williams, 15 years old at the time of the shooting and now 16, was charged Monday as an adult with second-degree murder in the shooting of 34-year-old Yuliya “Julia” Li, a marketing executive with H.B. Fuller who grew up in Kazakhstan and moved to Minnesota in 2007.
On Feb. 16, 2022, the St. Paul Police Department announced that it was conducting a homicide investigation in Payne-Phalen neighborhood.
“Callers to the Ramsey County Emergency Communications Center reported a shooting on the 1000 block of Payne Avenue at about 6:45 p.m. Officers rushed to the scene and found a woman inside a vehicle suffering from a gunshot wound,” cops said. “The officers rendered aid and called for Saint Paul Fire medics, who responded and transported the victim to Regions Hospital. She died a short time later.”
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The victim of St. Paul’s seventh 2022 homicide was later identified as Julia Li. The University of Minnesota graduate was married and liked to listen to jazz while playing cards, according to the Star Tribune. Li reportedly rose to the role of global business director at H.B. Fuller, where she started working in 2017.
After the shooting, cops said that they were looking for witnesses and for surveillance video from the area. The search for the evidence led to investigators to a video showing a Ford Taurus driver pulling up behind Li’s Mercedes-Benz and opening fire as the victim tried turning left at the intersection of Payne Avenue and Cook Avenue, the Pioneer Press reported.
Additional video from later on allegedly showed Melvin Williams’ “clearly visible” face as he got out of the Ford Taurus at the Cedar Park apartment complex where he lived. Cellphone data allegedly placed Williams at the shooting scene, as well.
Williams was arrested days after the shooting, but the teen with a reported “lengthy criminal history” was not named until Monday, when his case was moved to adult court.
A spokesperson for St. Paul Police previously told media that Julia Li “was just going about her daily business when she was shot.”
“There’s nothing to indicate she knew or had ever interacted with the suspect in this case,” St. Paul Police Department spokesperson Steve Linders reportedly said.
Williams remains in the custody of Ramsey County. His bail was reportedly set at $500,000.
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