Ex-Wife of Minnesota DOC Commissioner Sentenced for Poisoning Attempt on Son
On November 7, Julie Myhre-Schnell, 65, the former wife of Minnesota Department of Corrections Commissioner Paul Schnell, was sentenced to three years for trying to kill their disabled adult son. Myhre-Schnell’s sentence arrived three months after she pleaded guilty to first-degree attempted murder in relation to a botched scheme to poison her son, Paul Francis Schnell.
In December 2023, according to court documents filed the following year, Myhre-Schnell added a potentially lethal dose of crushed-up Lorazepam pills, an anti-anxiety medication, to her son’s feeding bag. Myhre-Schnell, who was visiting her son at his group home in Vadnais Heights, a suburb of Minneapolis, later admitted her crime to family members and told multiple people she had hoped he would “go to sleep forever.”
Paul Francis Schnell, who requires a wheelchair, ventilator, and 24-hour care, survived the ordeal, after being hospitalized the following day and suffering an acute respiratory failure, among other ailments. (There is no record of a toxicology test being administered while he was at the hospital). Around eight months later, Myhre-Schnell confessed to her son; he later told investigators “it was heavy” and “a lot to process.”
Appointed as head of Minnesota’s DOC in 2019, Paul Schnell filed for divorce from Myhre-Schnell two days before the poisoning attempt. Commissioner Schnell, the sole guardian of their son, filed a petition for an order of protection in June 2024. The filing revealed a potential motive, which is that Myhre-Schnell believed she saw Paul Francis Schnell being “tortured” while receiving months-long treatment for kidney stones and a kidney infection.
To avoid a conflict of interest, Myhre-Schnell will not be locked up at the sole women’s prison in Minnesota, MCF-Shakopee, which is operated by the DOC. As of this writing, she is, instead, being held at a local county jail until she can be transferred out of state, the Minneapolis State-Tribune reported. Commissioner Schnell has declined to comment on the sentence.
Before Myhre-Schnell entered her plea deal in July of this year, prosecutors had sought an 18-year sentence, the maximum under state law, with one attorney who handled the case calling the judge’s decision “completely inappropriate” and telling the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: “Prior to her plea, defendant showed little to no remorse. Defendant told law enforcement she regretted her son survived her attempts.”
Sources: CBS, KARE 11, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, St. Paul Pioneer Press
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