The ex-wife of the Minnesota Department of Corrections commissioner may be facing a maximum sentence after being charged with trying to kill her disabled son in December of 2023.
64-year old Julie Myhre-Schnell faces 1st-degree attempted murder charges after she allegedly put anti-anxiety medication in her 33-year-old disabled son's feeding bag. She allegedly told multiple people that she was trying to kill her son, "hoping he would go to sleep forever."
An investigation into Myhre-Schnell began in June after the Ramsey County Sheriff's Office learned of an attempted homicide last December at a group home in Vadnais Heights. She was accused of attempted murder in August.
A message was left with her attorney this week stating that prosecutor's intended to seek the longest possible sentence which is 20 years in prison.
Myhre-Schnell is currently out on $50,000 bail and is due back in court later Friday.
Myhre-Schnell's the former wife of Paul Schnell, who has been the Commissioner of the DOC in Minnesota since being appointed by Governor Tim Walz in 2019. They had been estranged and their divorce was finalized in October.
WCCO-TV has reported that the victim does not appear to have suffered any lasting health effects from the alleged overdose attempt. He was taken in by the Schnell family as a foster child as an infant, and according to the Star Tribune, “has considerable medical issues” that include spina bifida and a malformed brain stem.