No charges will be filed against a man who ripped a Black Lives Matter (BLM) sign from a woman at a Maple River football game last October.
The Blue Earth County Attorney’s Office received investigation results of the incident more than three months ago from Mapleton police.
Assistant county attorney Ryan Hansch says prosecutors were required to apply the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard when reviewing police reports and documents.
“The conflicting evidence did not rise to the level needed to support criminal charges,” says Hansch.
It took a month to conduct the investigation, says Police Chief Benjamin Honsey, that involved the interviewing of multiple individuals.
Attempts to contact Nusser and Herrmann for comment were not successful.
On Oct. 1, Laura Marie Nusser was holding a BLM sign in the bleachers when a man, who reportedly was wearing a Make America Great Again (MAGA) cap, grabbed it from her hands and tossed it to the ground.
The man was later identified by Nusser as Kip Herrmann, who was allowed to stay and watch the game while she was told to leave at the request of school district administrators because of her “offensive language.”
Nusser, whose two sons were on the team at the time, says she was sitting in the student section with her sign because of an alleged incident earlier that day.
According to one of her sons, both who are biracial, a classmate made an off-color remark during a homecoming activity about him going to the back of the line to wait behind white students.