Minnetonka Man Charged with Pistol-Whipping, Choking Woman

A Minnetonka man has been charged with pistol-whipping and strangling a woman, injuring her badly enough to cause bleeding in her brain before he was arrested at gunpoint by Minneapolis police.

Natheniel Leonta Lloyd, 27, is charged with four felonies in the Aug. 12 incident: first-degree assault with a dangerous weapon, which carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a $30,000 fine and a minimum prison sentence of three years; making terroristic threats and domestic assault, each of which has a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a $10,000 fine; and domestic assault by strangulation, for which the maximum penalty is three years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

According to the criminal complaint, signed by Minneapolis Police Sgt. Christopher Karakostas, police were called to a home just before 12:30 p.m. Aug. 12 on a report of a domestic assault.

When officers arrived, they saw Lloyd running from the home. The victim told police that Lloyd had assaulted her and that he was armed with a gun.

The woman said that she arrived home at midnight and began arguing with Lloyd with whom she had been romantically involved for four years. She said Lloyd began to slap her and break items in the house and that as the night wore on, he hit her repeatedly in the face and choked her several times, causing her to lose consciousness at one point.

Police say Lloyd also threatened to kill the victim, telling her that he could kill her, but he loved her so much that if he did, he would also have to kill himself. During the assault, Lloyd pulled out a gun and threatened the woman with it, then pressed it to her face and pistol-whipped her, the complaint charges.

The woman was able to send a text message to her mother, asking her to call police. Lloyd confiscated the victim’s cell phone, but when her mother called back, he gave her the phone. When he overheard the woman’s mother saying she was going to call police, he said that if officers arrived, “there’s gonna be a shootout,” according to the complaint.

Police chased Lloyd, who refused to stop. Officers used guns and force to apprehend Lloyd and found a gun a few feet from where he was arrested.

The victim, who had a swollen left eye and bruises on her neck, was taken by ambulance to a hospital. She was kept there overnight because her injuries had caused her brain to bleed, according to the complaint.

Lloyd was in the Hennepin County Jail on a $170,000 bond. He was scheduled to make a first appearance on Aug. 15 in Hennepin County District Court.

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