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To place an obituary, please include the information from the obituary checklist below in an email to obits@pioneerpress.com. There is no option to place them through our website. Feel free to contact our obituary desk at 651-228-5263 with any questions. General Information: Your full name, Address (City, State, Zip Code), Phone number, And an alternate phone number (if any) Obituary Specification: Name of Deceased, Obituary Text, A photo in a JPEG or PDF file is preferable, TIF and other files are accepted, we will contact you if there are any issues with the photo. Ad Run dates There is a discount for running more than one day, but this must be scheduled on the first run date to apply. If a photo is used, it must be used for both days for the discount to apply, contact us for more information. Policies: Verification of Death: In order to publish obituaries a name and phone number of funeral home/cremation society is required. We must contact the funeral home/cremation society handling the arrangements during their business hours to verify the death. If the body of the deceased has been donated to the University of Minnesota Anatomy Bequest Program, or a similar program, their phone number is required for verification. Please allow enough time to contact them especially during their limited weekend hours. A death certificate is also acceptable for this purpose but only one of these two options are necessary. Guestbook and Outside Websites: We are not allowed to reference other media sources with a guestbook or an obituary placed elsewhere when placing an obituary in print and online. We may place a website for a funeral home or a family email for contact instead; contact us with any questions regarding this matter. Obituary Process: Once your submission is completed, we will fax or email a proof for review prior to publication in the newspaper. This proof includes price and days the notice is scheduled to appear. Please review the proof carefully. We must be notified of errors or changes before the notice appears in the Pioneer Press based on each day’s deadlines. After publication, we will not be responsible for errors that may occur after final proofing. Online: Changes to an online obituary can be handled through the obituary desk. Call us with further questions. Payment Procedure: Pre-payment is required for all obituary notices prior to publication by the deadline specified below in our deadline schedule. Please call 651-228-5263 with your payment information after you have received the proof and approved its contents. Credit Card: Payment accepted by phone only due to PCI (Payment Card Industry) regulations EFT: Check by phone. Please provide your routing number and account number. Cash: Accepted at our FRONT COUNTER Monday – Friday from 8:00AM – 3:30PM Rates: The minimum charge is $162 for the first 10 lines. Every line after the first 10 is $12.20. If the ad is under 10 lines it will be charged the minimum rate of $162. On a second run date, the lines are $8.20 per line, starting w/ the first line. For example: if first run date was 20 lines the cost would be $164. Each photo published is $125 per day. For example: 2 photos in the paper on 2 days would be 4 photo charges at $500. Deadlines: Please follow deadline times to ensure your obituary is published on the day requested. Hours Deadline (no exceptions) Ad Photos MEMORIAM (NON-OBITUARY) REQUEST Unlike an obituary, Memoriam submissions are remembrances of a loved one who has passed. The rates for a memoriam differ from obituaries. Please call or email us for more memoriam information Please call 651-228-5280 for more information. HOURS: Monday – Friday 8:00AM – 5:00PM (CLOSED WEEKENDS and HOLIDAYS) Please submit your memoriam ad to memoriams@pioneerpress.com or call 651-228-5280. Charges say a St. Paul man drove to Monticello to pick up a 13-year-old girl he had just met on a dating app, gave her alcohol and marijuana and sexually assaulted her at his apartment. Brandon Jesse Johnson, 32, was charged Tuesday in Ramsey County District Court with first-degree criminal sexual conduct and possession of a firearm without a permit in connection with the incident. A judge set Johnson’s bail at $80,000, and he remained jailed mid-afternoon Tuesday. An attorney is not listed in his court file. According to the criminal complaint: St. Paul police about 11 a.m. Sunday responded to a call to assist another law enforcement agency looking for the girl. Officers tracked her phone to Johnson’s apartment in the 1200 block of Sherburne Avenue in the city’s Hamline-Midway neighborhood. Johnson answered his door wearing only jogging pants. When asked if he knew the girl, he said she was in the shower and allowed officers inside to check on her. Officers found her on a bed partially clothed. The girl told police she had downloaded a dating app and connected with Johnson early that morning. She said he picked her up around 3 a.m. at a park near her Monticello home and brought her back to St. Paul. He assaulted her multiple times at his apartment, the complaint says. She underwent a medical examination at Midwest Children’s Medical Center. She said Johnson offered her “weed” and alcohol in his car and that she felt “completely out of it” and fell at his doorstep. She said he had gun in his car and that it “scared her and made her fear she would get shot if she left,” the complaint continues. After the assaults, Johnson fell asleep and she texted her mom for help, the complaint says. In his car, police found a black semi-automatic pistol on the driver’s side floorboard between the seat and pedals. A used condom was in a kitchen garbage can and a bottle of tequila on the kitchen counter. In an interview at the jail, Johnson denied having any sexual contact with the girl and said he did not pick her up for that purpose. Monticello is just under an hour northwest of St. Paul. Johnson showed police messages he exchanged with the girl on the Lovely app. About 3:15 a.m., she “reached out and said, ‘Hey,’ to which (Johnson) “told her to come to his place to watch a movie,” the complaint reads. “(The girl) said she couldn’t drive and he offered to go and get her.” Johnson also admitted the gun was his and that he didn’t have a permit to carry, the complaint says. Evidence collected from the girl’s examination and a forensic examination of Johnson has been submitted to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension for testing and comparison; results are pending.
