Jun 07, 2007 - 06:06:47 CDT
By JENNYMICHAEL and TOM STROMMEMINOT - Last week, Anita Knutson was a happy girl in high heels and pigtails, a petite former homecoming attendant with the largest portion of her life ahead of her.
Now she is the focus of prayers and tears in the small north-central North Dakota towns of Velva and Butte.
Knutson, 18, was found dead Monday afternoon by her father and landlady in her apartment at 2420 Fourth St. NW.
Knutson was originally from Butte, and had just completed her first year at Minot State. She was a 2006 Velva High School graduate and the daughter of Gordon and Sharon Knutson, according to today's Velva Area Voice newspaper.
Police are following up on leads, including one from a woman who reported seeing a man running north on Fourth Street early Sunday morning, away from the area of Knutson's apartment building, Lt. Dan Strandberg said.
He said police are considering the death a homicide based on evidence at the scene. Knutson's body has been sent to Bismarck for an autopsy. Police believe an unknown intruder broke into Knutson's apartment.
Strandberg said the witness described the man she saw running as being about 6-feet-2-inches tall and 200 pounds with dark hair. She said he was wearing a white T-shirt and dark-colored shorts.
The man did not appear to be out for a morning jog, Strandberg said the woman reported.
"She said, no, he was, like, running hard," Strandberg said.
Matt Murphy, a student at Minot State, lived in the apartment across the yard from Knutson's. He said he rides his bike often and parks it in a bike rack next to Knutson's bedroom window. He went to get his bicycle at noon Monday and noticed the window was broken with glass on the ground.
"I went over there because I bike down to work, and I saw the window was busted out, and I didn't think anything of it," he said.
Minot police are working with that and all the other information they can get.
"We are working on lots of leads the best we can,"Detective Robert Barnard said.
Velva teachers remember Knutson as an active student who was involved in speech, FCCLA and Relay For Life, was a member of the homecoming court, and attended high school football games even as a college student.
Alice Westby, a Velva teacher who taught Knutson all four years she was in high school, said Knutson was a positive person.
"She loved high heels, purses and always wore skirts," Westby said. "She always had a positive way of doing things."
"When she was in our building, she was very active. She was smiley and happy and colorful," said Iris Swedlund, school librarian. "She was a spark, and if you had a bad day and you saw Anita, she always made your day. Idon't think I ever saw her down."
Westby said Knutson was majoring in elementary education at Minot State. She said she heard on her way home from Minot that Knutson had died.
"Oh no, not Anita," was her first thought, she said. "Then I thought of what we were doing a year ago and how active she was."
Westby said something like this forces people to think about their own kids. "And they all got phone calls last night," she said.
Denise Tobey, front desk clerk at Minot's Fairfield Inn, said Knutson had worked at the hotel for about a year, stripping beds and helping housekeepers.
Tobey described Knutson as petite, with perfectly matching clothes and ribbons in the pigtails in her dark hair.
"She was just the cutest little girl," she said. "She was very pretty, and she didn't act like she was. She didn't know she was."
Tobey said Knutson was happy-go-lucky and well-liked by everyone at the hotel.
"This should have never happened to her,"she said. "We're all still in shock that this happened to her. We just hope they catch the guy who did it."
According to the Velva newspaper, Knutson also worked part time at Vanity, in Minot.
Knutson's suspicious death follows those of other North Dakota college students in recent years. Valley City State University student Mindy Morgenstern, from New Salem, was found slain in her off-campus apartment on Sept. 13, 2006. Moe Maurice Gibbs is slated to stand trial for Class AAfelony murder in that case later this month. The trial will be held in Minot.
Dru Sjodin, a University of North Dakota student, was abducted at a Grand Forks shopping mall on Nov. 22, 2003. Her body was found the following April in a ravine near Crookston, Minn. Alfonso Rodriguez Jr. was sentenced to death in federal court in February for the kidnapping and killing of Sjodin.
Minot has had one other death ruled a homicide so far in 2007. Jennifer Erickson, 28, of Parshall, was found dead in a northwest Minot home on April 30. Jay Washek has been charged with Class AA felony murder in that case.
Amemorial service for Knutson is scheduled for 1 p.m. Monday at the Oak Valley Lutheran Church in Velva, according to the Velva Area Voice.
Strandberg asks anyone who had contact with Knutson over the weekend, anyone with information about the man seen running on Fourth Street or anyone with any other information to call the Minot Police Department at 701-852-0111.
(Reach reporter Jenny Michael at 250-8225 or jenny.michael@;bismarcktribune.com.)
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