MINNEAPOLIS – An Iowa woman charged with fatally stabbing her ex-partner in Minneapolis, and then crashed the victim’s car with her body inside in southern Minnesota, is considered competent to stand trial.
Margot G. Lewis, 32, was charged this summer with two counts of manslaughter and interference with a corpse in the death of 35-year-old Liara Tsai.
Tsai’s body was found in her car, which Lewis crashed on June 22 on Interstate 90 in Eyota, just southeast of Rochester.
A Hennepin County judge ruled Wednesday that Lewis’ trial can proceed. Her next court hearing is scheduled for October 21.
Details from Lewis’ criminal complaint
Officers responded to Lewis’ crash and found her sitting “on a lawn chair in the median of the highway.”
According to the criminal complaint, a Minnesota State Patrol crash reconstruction determined that Lewis, of North Liberty, Iowa, was traveling more than 100 miles per hour on I-90 before the crash.
Witnesses at the scene told officers that a dead body was in the backseat of the crashed car, “wrapped in bedding, a mattress and covered with a tarp” with Tsai’s head visible, the complaint said.
Tsai’s dog was also found wandering the scene. The animal had a microchip that eventually led investigators to Tsai’s Minneapolis residence, the complaint said, where police “encountered a bloody scene.”
Olivia Anderson
The medical examiner’s office later determined that Tsai’s cause of death was from a “gaping stab wound” to her neck, and not from the crash.
The complaint states that Lewis was taken to a hospital after the crash, where she refused to speak to investigators because she had taken “a vow of silence” but agreed to “communicate in sign language.” Investigators say Lewis then attacked officers when they tried to obtain her fingernail clippings as evidence.
I remember Liara Tsai
Tsai’s friends told WCCO in June that she had just moved to Minneapolis from Iowa.
“She was just always herself and she wanted to inspire everyone around her to always be their truest and most authentic selves,” says friend Olivia Anderson.
Tsai was a crisis counselor and DJ who was just days away from playing the biggest event of her career in New York City.
“She was so connected to her humanity, her divinity and her love,” said friend Levi Lake. “I’m really sad that she won’t be here to experience that.”
The maximum sentence for a second-degree murder conviction is 40 years.
NOTE: The original air date of the video for this article is June 28, 2024.
Local domestic violence resources
Women’s lawyers
wadvocates.org
Crisis Line: (651) 227-8284
St. Paul & Ramsey County Domestic Violence Intervention Project
stpaulintervention.org
Crisis Line: (651) 645-2824
Minnesota day one
dayoneservices.org
Crisis Line: 1-866-223-1111
Esperanza United
esperanzaunited.org
Bilingual Crisis Line: (651) 772-1611.
For anonymous, confidential help, people can call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or 1-800-787-3224.
If you or someone you know in the LGBTQ+ community needs support, there are numerous resources and services available through Outside Minnesota, NAMI And Twin Cities pride.
