North Branch woman describes run-in with armed carjacking suspect

NORTH BRANCH, Minn. (KMSP) - A day later and still a lot of questions remain about the actions of an armed carjacking suspect, who had his young daughter with him when he was shot and killed by police near Harris, Minnesota.

The chain of events unfolded on Monday morning throughout Chisago County.

Betty Schlipp of North Branch told Fox 9 she had a run-in with the man before the deadly encounter.

"He looked at me and he said, ‘No cops. Absolutely no cops,’” said Schlipp.

Schlipp didn't know what to think or do early Monday morning when a man she had never seen or met before stepped into her North Branch breezeway and attempted to push his way into her house.

"I haven't seen anyone on drugs,” said Schlipp. “I'm far away from that scene. But he was just not a normal person. He didn't seem normal."

The man was carrying his daughter wrapped in a blanket. She recalled that the young child was actually sleeping with her head on her father's shoulder.

The man demanded to use her car, but she told him no.

It was the same man who would end up dead a couple hours later in a rural Chisago County farm field after several officers opened fired on him. Despite the strange circumstances, Schlipp says she wasn’t afraid.

“Not at the time because I knew I had to be in control,” she said. “I was not frightened at the time until he left and I got to thinking how dangerous that situation could have been."

The man carjacked another vehicle at gunpoint just minutes after leaving Schlipp’s home.

Authorities have said he made suicidal threats and asked law enforcement to come get his daughter in the moments before the deadly encounter just off I-35 near Harris.

The young girl was reportedly in the stolen car when her dad was killed.

"I feel bad that he was so distraught,” said Schlipp. “I feel bad for that child."

Schlipp says me she never saw the man's gun and that he seemed very careful with his sleeping child.

Making the case even more bizarre, a law enforcement source told Fox 9 that he left behind a running van at the scene of the armed carjacking. Police are still investigating why he needed a different vehicle and why he was in North Branch.