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MPR News Staff
St. Paul

Minneapolis man charged for beating Metro Transit bus driver

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A Minneapolis man was charged with third-degree assault in the beating of a Metro Transit bus driver, the Hennepin County Attorney's Office said Wednesday.

Sterling Smith, 26, is expected to make his first court appearance Thursday.

According to the criminal complaint, the bus was at Emerson and 15th avenues in north Minneapolis on April 10 when three women boarded the bus. When the driver asked one of the women to stop swearing, she "became more uncooperative, so the driver called the dispatcher and asked for police to come and remove her," according to a statement released by the prosecutor's office.

The woman told another person on the bus that the driver had made "racial comments."

The woman phoned Smith, her boyfriend, who caught up with the bus, got his girlfriend off, then boarded the bus again and "began striking the driver about the head. The driver was able to activate his alarm and Smith fled," according to the complaint.

Officers say when they arrived, they found the driver with blood on his nose and upper lip, a cut to his right eye lid and scrapes to his forehead. The driver also said he was suffering from double vision, a condition that continued for at least two more days, according to the charging document.

Police found Smith and Smith told them he thought he heard the driver use a racial slur. However, police investigators said the entire incident was recorded and no such statement is heard, according to the complaint.