A man has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for arson at Target’s downtown Minneapolis headquarters during a riot in August 2020.
On Wednesday, Leroy Lemonte Perry Williams, 37, was sentenced to 120 months in prison followed by three years of supervised released in U.S. District Court. He was convicted of one court of arson in October of last year.
The incident was part of rioting that took place in downtown Minneapolis amid misinformation about a man’s suicide on Aug. 26, 2020.
According to court documents, Williams and others broke into Target’s corporate headquarters in downtown Minneapolis and attempted to set fire to the inside and outside of the building.
Earlier that night, the Minneapolis Police Department said a man – later identified as 38-year-old Eddie Sole Jr. – had fatally shot himself on Nicollet Avenue between 8th and 9th streets. The man was wanted in connection to a homicide in a nearby parking ramp.
After Sole Jr.’s death, posts were made on social media suggesting police were involved in the shooting. When a crowd gathered downtown and began to clash with police, MPD released a video of the suspect appearing to kill himself.