Police: Man kills wife, self at strip mall

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COTTAGE GROVE, Minn., Oct. 26 (UPI) -- A St. Paul, Minn.-area man shot and killed his estranged wife then turned the gun on himself in a strip-mall parking lot, police said.

Cottage Grove Police Chief Craig Woolery said Friday the female victim, identified as Tensia Richard, 22, had expressed fear that her husband, Chevel Charles Richard, also 22, could snap at any time, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported.

"She thought there could be a snapping point with him," the chief said.

Tensia Richard died in a Jimmy John's sandwich shop in a Cottage Grove strip mall after her husband chased and shot her, then shot himself in the head, Woolery said.

The husband died later at an area hospital.

Tensia Richard had filed for divorce from her husband, who was living in another suburb. She was living with their two sons, a 3-year-old and a 5-month-old, at her parents' house in Cottage Grove.

Conflicting reports on the shooting came from a member of a nearby exercise club and one of its officials.

Steve Mack of Cottage Grove said he was changing clothes in the facility when he heard a commotion.

Mack said the woman had been exercising and was shot at through the front door, but Mark Daly, a spokesman for the fitness chain that operates the club, said the victim was not in the facility and no shots were fired into the building, the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported.