A St. Paul man was sentenced Monday to nine years in prison for slashing his girlfriend’s throat at the Union Depot light-rail platform.
The woman survived the May 9 attack by Ray Anthony Criss and credited good Samaritans with saving her life.
Criss, 37, pleaded guilty to second-degree assault after reaching an agreement with the prosecution on March 6 that called for dismissing attempted murder and first-degree assault charges.
Officers responded to the Union Depot platform in downtown St. Paul and found the 40-year-old woman with a severe cut to her throat and bystanders applying pressure.
She was hospitalized and police learned her boyfriend, Criss, had threatened to kill her for weeks and said he would do it “right in front of police,” according to the criminal complaint.
A security officer told officers that the couple had been arguing inside Union Depot. Surveillance video showed Criss exit a train, approach his girlfriend and cut her throat with a knife, the complaint said.
Police arrested Criss at his St. Paul apartment two days later. He told officers he was not the man in surveillance photos and said he wasn’t at Union Depot that day.
He was on probation
Ramsey County District Judge Kelly Olmstead sentenced Criss to 110 months in prison on Monday. The sentence was an upward durational departure from state guidelines. He will receive credit for 349 days already served in custody.
Criss has six other felony convictions dating to 2006. At the time of the attack, he was on probation for a burglarizing a St. Paul apartment in June 2020.
