St. Paul Man Guilty For 100 MPH Impaired Driving Fatal Crash

St. Paul, MN (MinnesotaNow) - A guilty plea was entered today by a St. Paul man who was accused of causing a deadly crash last fall while he was impaired and speeding at around 100 mph.

According to court records, 30-year-old Talon Covie-Cardwell Walker was driving a pickup when he sideswiped an SUV on an exit ramp from I-94 in Minneapolis and then smashed into the back of another vehicle. Witnesses told the State Patrol that the pickup was going approximately 100 mph at the time of the crash.

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The collision triggered a pileup on the exit ramp involving a total of five other vehicles and resulted in the death of the driver of the vehicle that was rear-ended by Walker's pickup. She was identified as 26-year-old Natalie Gubbay of Minneapolis. The criminal complaint says Walker and several other occupants of the vehicles were transported to the hospital with serious injuries.

The court document also states that State Troopers located an open and partially full bottle of liquor on the driver’s side floorboard in Walker's pickup. It also notes that Walker previously had his driver's license revoked in 2021 under Minnesota's Implied Consent law.

Minnesota State Patrol photo

According to the criminal complaint, investigators later spoke with a woman who was a passenger in Walker's vehicle. She stated that Walker had smoked a large amount of marijuana prior to getting behind the wheel. She also told investigators that after he went upstairs in his cousin’s home, he came back down and appeared "zoned out" and clearly under the influence of a controlled substance.

The charges say that testing of a blood sample taken from Walker after he was transported to the hospital following the fatal crash measured his blood-alcohol concentration at 0.093. The testing also detected the presence of marijuana and fentanyl.

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Walker was charged with eight felonies, including two counts of criminal vehicular homicide and six counts of criminal vehicular operation. The criminal complaint also lists five gross misdemeanor counts of criminal vehicular operation and a gross misdemeanor DWI charge.

Under the terms of his plea agreement with Ramsey County prosecutors, Walker today admitted to one count of criminal vehicular homicide and two counts of felony criminal vehicular operation in exchange for the dismissal of the other charges. He is scheduled to be sentenced in October.

See How Minnesota's License Plates Have Evolved Since 1909

Nothing beats a nostalgia trip. It's always fun to see how things looked the year you were born and how much they've changed throughout the years.

Minnesota's license plates have certainly gone through many evolutions. The first "license plate" was actually a rectangular black leather automobile license tag with a brass number '1' on the center front. It was issued by the State Boiler Inspector in the State of Minnesota in 1903.

The first Minnesota license plate as we know it was issued in 1909. Let's take a look at that license plate and then all the plates that followed, along with some interesting Wikipedia knowledge as we go.

We've certainly come a long way, but it's also interesting that the now popular blackout plates have been around before.

Gallery Credit: David Drew