Bystanders halt stranger’s sex assault outside Minneapolis apartment building, charges say

A woman was sexually assaulted by a stranger outside a south Minneapolis apartment building until bystanders interrupted the daylight attack and quickly identified the suspect to police a few blocks away, according to charges filed Tuesday.

Marquis Jeffery McLoyd Jr., 27, of Minneapolis, was charged in Hennepin County District Court with two counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct in connection with the assault about 6:30 p.m. Saturday in the 3500 block of S. Bryant Avenue.

McLoyd remains jailed in lieu of $250,000 bail ahead of a court appearance on Wednesday. Court records do not list an attorney for him.

According to the criminal complaint and a related court filing:

Officers arrived to the apartment building on the well-traveled street and saw the woman on sidewalk. She was crying, and her clothes were disheveled.

She told police she was sitting on a brick wall in front of the building waiting for her boyfriend to arrive when a man she did not know said something to her and sent her falling backward into the wall. Her head hit the bricks.

As she said “no” and fought with McLoyd, he penetrated her with a hand.

McLoyd fled on foot after bystanders responded to the woman’s cries for help.

“One of the witnesses followed him while speaking to 911 dispatch on the phone,” a court filing read. “When MPD officers arrived, this witness flagged down the squads and pointed out the suspect.”

Officers found McLoyd about two blocks away, and he fled briefly until his arrest. Two witnesses to the assault implicated him as the attacker.