Crime and Punishment: the Zaria McKeever Case

By Abdi Mohamed

Contributing Writer

In an MSR exclusive, Tiffynnie Epps shares her family’s journey in seeking justice for the murder of her sister Zaria McKeever, a crime that is at the heart of the juvenile justice reform debate.

iffynnie Epps grew up as an army brat.

Her parents both served in the military, which took their family from Georgia to states like Michigan and Alabama. They eventually settled in Minnesota roughly 20 years ago when Epps’ youngest sister, Zaria McKeever, was just three years old.

“She’s the big baby,” Epps laughed as she spoke about her sister. McKeever graduated from Champlin Park High School and went on to receive a degree at PCI Academy in Plymouth. According to Epps, her sister loved to do makeup and enjoyed cooking and dancing.

The two were close and plotted their life out together. McKeever had already planned for Epps to be her babysitter long before she gave birth to her daughter. The two sisters got pregnant around the same time and gave birth to their children one day apart. Not long after sharing this life-changing milestone, Epps and her family experienced the tragic loss.

Epps recalled the night that she first heard about her sister McKeever’s murder. She received a call from one of her sister’s friends who was on the phone with 23-year-old McKeever when suddenly the line cut out. Concerned, Epps rushed over to her sister’s apartment in Brooklyn Park.

There she came across an ambulance and police vehicles parked in front of the building, confirming her worst fears.

Officers came to Epps and informed her that her sister hadn’t made it. Six months later Epps and her family are fighting to ensure that McKeever receives prosecutorial tug-of-war between the Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty and the state’s attorney general, Keith Ellison, who was appointed by Governor Tim Walz to take over the case.

Three adults, including Erick Haynes, the 23-year-old father of McKeever’s oneyear-old daughter, and two juveniles have been charged with second-degree murder. According to Haynes, he had bought a gun and handed it to the two young men to use on McKeever’s boyfriend. He then drove them to her apartment and instructed them to break her door down, resulting in the killing of McKeever. The fate of the juveniles charged—two brothers 15 and 17 years old—is at the heart of this conflict between the county attorney and state officials.

■ See CRIME on page 5