The Apple River Stabbing ~ The Trial & Aftermath

 

We have spoken about the events leading up to the fatal stabbing of Isaac Schuman, and the life altering stabbings of four other young people. By this point Nicolae Miu had been arrested, no one sure what was going to be the charges and his fate.

Nicolae Miu, the accused of a stabbing that killed a teenager and injured four others has been charged with murder, according to court documents. 

He had been charged with one count of first-degree intentional homicide in the death of 17-year-old Isaac Schuman, and four counts of attempted first-degree intentional homicide in connection to the Saturday afternoon (July 30th 2022) incident. 

Miu made his first court appearance, virtually, on Monday, August 1, 2022, the judge setting his bail at $1 million cash. He was told he isn't eligible for a public defender because of his finances, and he faces life in prison if he's convicted of the top charge. Nicolae Miu has been claiming self-defense from the beginning, and there was a preliminary hearing on Friday, August 12, 2022 at 10am.

At the hearing, the prosecution laid the criminal complaint detailing the stabbing on the Apple River near the sunrise bridge in Somerset, Wisconsin, which allegedly started after Miu was apparently looking for a friend's cellphone in the river but was confronted by tubers who said he was "acting sketchy". The encounter escalated, and he apparently punched a female on the left side of her face before Miu was punched, eventually leading to the stabbing.

Witnesses who called emergency services, were describing the scene, revealing how Miu was stabbing the young adults in their mid section, one of the victims looked like they had been disemboweled. Isaac Schuman was found lifeless by the time emergency services arrived.

Miu, who has claimed self-defense, has a preliminary hearing at 10 a.m. on Aug. 12, 2022.  

To begin, Miu, had fled the scene, but not unnoticed. A witness called police at 4:45 p.m., reporting they saw the suspect downriver at Prospect Park. He was detained at the Rivers Edge Campground, where he had been camping with his wife and some friends.

Miu's wife told investigators, they arrived at the campground at 10:45 a.m. to go tubing. She claimed her husband donned SCUBA gear, leaving the group to find a phone that a friend had lost in the river. The second time he tried to look, a group of guys got off their tubes and started hitting him. She saw this and yelled to their friends, two of whom started running toward the fight. 

She claims to have heard screaming, then her husband and their friends were returning; but she didn't see what happened. She said the two friends were not involved; Miu was already on his way back when they reached him. 

(I am a little suspicious about her claims here. She saw everything but the stabbing, and immediately states that the friends were back before her husband, AND clearly heard people call him a pedophile... but didn't see or hear anything else)???

Miu's wife told investigators Miu had a knife in his pocket and he told her, "Those guys grabbed it from him," adding the group called him a pedophile and attacked him, charges said.

Ironically, witnesses' statements seem to match what the young adults and victims were saying. They witnessed Nicolae Miu slap and punch a female; which resulted in a male from the group to punch Miu back. Miu fell into the river. Miu got back up and began stabbing multiple people; whomever was around him, he stabbed.

Authorities located the knife upstream on the west bank of the river. It appeared to have bloody flesh attached. (Proven to be from the victims).

Investigators also obtained video of the incident. The video showed Miu, shirtless, carrying goggles with a snorkel attached up to the group and he grabs onto their tubes as the group yells to Miu to get away. Miu then walks around the tubes, as if he's looking for something, before walking away with his back to the tubing party. He then turns around and says something to the tubers before walking away again toward the Highway 35 bridge.

The video, according to charges, then shows people converging toward Miu, yelling for him to walk away. He then walked toward a female, who was telling him to go away. In the video, people can be heard saying he was "looking for little girls." Then a larger group converged toward the area and multiple people were yelling at Miu, with at least one person touching his shoulder.

Later in the video, it appears two females confront Miu, and he takes out his knife. The camera pans away, and commotion begins with multiple people converging toward Miu. 

Miu then falls back into the water and is slapped with an open hand. He then gets back to his feet before being shoved back by a male in yellow swimming trunks. He then starts emerging from the water with his knife in his hand and the person in yellow swimming trunks shoves him again. That's when Miu stabs him in the abdomen.

The video then shows Miu making stabbing motions toward others as at least one person touches his back, charges said. Witnesses told investigators Miu was acting "sketchily."

Miu continued to maintain that he feared for his life, but he is clearly heard on the video as arguing with the young people, saying if they were children, they should not be drinking alcohol and he was NOT a child molester. 

(To me, this does not sound like a scared man... if he was truly afraid, he would have left before it escalated any further, no?)

Nicolae Miu, who was convicted of stabbing five people, one fatally, during the July 30, 2022 tubing excursion along the Apple River in Wisconsin. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison Wednesday, July 31st, 2022. He had already been found guilty of fifirst-degree reckless homicide in the death of 17-year-old Isaac Schuman. He was also convicted of battery and recklessly endangering safety with an aggravated factor of the use of a dangerous weapon in connection with the wounded victims: A.J. Martin, Dante Carlson, Tony Carlson and Rhyley Mattison.

“(Miu) left the scene, leaving his victims to die while casually floating past them and emergency workers as if nothing had happened,” St. Croix County District Judge R. Michael Waterman said while handing down the sentence, which came just after the two-year anniversary of the attack.

(I am sure there are people who will agree, or strongly disagree with this sentencing. I feel the District Judge definitely got it right. There was absolutely no need to return to the fight, after he had already walked away. He returned with the intention to do physical harm. Did he intend to kill someone??? Only he can answer that. I find him to be a coward to be striking a woman in the first place; everything was soooo preventable. WHY?)

The End