The Apple River Stabbing ~ Events Leading to the Tragedy

On July 30, 2022, it was a beautiful day out in Somerset, Wisconsin. Many people went to go tubing down the Apple River; unfortunately one person would not be coming home, while four others would be severely wounded. 

No one suspected a murder would occur while enjoying such a innocent, quiet afternoon cooling off in Apple River.

Before I begin... there are conflicting reports on what lead to this altercation. I am going to write what one of the victims said, and what the assailant claimed in court; the rest is up to you to decide what was the right conclusion... The law can get very convoluted when it comes to cases like this.

According to Rhyley Mattison, a 24-year-old from Burnsville, after the events happened and she was in the hospital. She wrote a status on her social media, revealing that her and a few of her friends had been stabbed by a "random man". 

She quickly revealed that she had no clue who the man was; letting her friends and followers know this...

"Some friends and I were tubing when we came [across] a group who were asking for our help. My friends and I went over to see what was going on and there was an older man there being inappropriate and was asked to leave but wouldn’t. The older man ended up having a knife and stabbed a few friends of mine and myself included." 

Police arrived quickly on the scene after several 911 calls from many bystanders. They arrived on scene at 3:45pm and saw the carnage and civilians helping the wounded; not clear on what had occurred. All they knew at the moment was they had 4 young people who had been stabbed and a 5th one who was deceased from fatal stab wounds. Now the questions arose...

What happened? Who stabbed these young people?? All the police knew was that the suspect and the victims were tubing in the river at the same time. It should be noted that the suspect had fled the scene, he was found three quarters of a mile up the river; an hour and a half after the incident, Nicolae Miu was arrested.

St. Croix County Sheriff Scott Knudson was asked to descibe the scene. His only response was, "Chaotic. Scary. I'm sure that anybody that witnessed this will never forget it. So it is a tragedy." At this point, detective, including the K9 Unit had not found the weapon.

To be Continued...