Fargo man gets 5 years for random punch attack in Downtown Fargo

Valley News Live ^ | 02/20/26 | Devin Fry

[Fury]

FARGO, N.D. (Valley News Live) - A Fargo man has been sentenced to prison for a 2025 assault in which he punched a stranger at random in downtown Fargo.

Royal Rockefeller was found guilty of aggravated assault and sentenced Thursday to five years in the custody of the North Dakota Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. He must serve a minimum of three years before becoming eligible for release.

[Uncle Miltie]

Grok:

“Socially, he comes from a Native American family in the Upper Midwest but has lived a marginalized, high-risk lifestyle marked by long-term involvement with the criminal justice system. He was raised in or around Minnesota/North Dakota Indigenous and urban Native circles. At age 16 (circa 1995), as Matthew Runningshield, he participated in a brutal robbery-murder in Minneapolis, for which he served nearly 20 years in Minnesota state prison (including time at Oak Park Heights). He legally changed his name to Royal Rockefeller while incarcerated in 2005. 

Since release, he has lived in Iowa and then Fargo, ND, where he has accumulated multiple felony and misdemeanor convictions since 2022 for assaults, domestic violence, terrorizing, and drug-related offenses. Police and court reports describe frequent contacts involving paranoia, erratic/violent behavior, and transient or unstable circumstances. He has no noted ties to elite or mainstream social circles—the “Rockefeller” name appears to be a personal/legal alias with no actual connection to the famous Rockefeller family. In short: ethnically Native American (Sioux/Lakota/Dakota descent from ND/SD/MN communities), religiously undocumented in public sources, and socially from an Indigenous background but shaped by repeated incarceration, urban/transient life, and criminal involvement. All details come from court filings, news coverage of his cases, and public family records; no private or sealed biographical data was accessed”

As for myself, having lived in North Dakota and attended every Pow Wow I could with my Jewish Daughter, we found the local Indians to be wild and wonderful people. Often, we were the only Europeans in attendance. The dance, dress, drumming and singing could totally blow your mind. When you’re standing next to 10 ecstatic drummers, 20 howling singers, and half a dozen young often beautiful young dancers in native dress, it is a VERY LOUD AND RAUCOUS scene. I miss that.

[Uncle Miltie]

And now for the true statistics Furry is so desperately trying to “white” wash (but failed, he Indian-washed):

Grok:

Imprisonment for Violent Offenses (BJS, State Prisons ~2021–2022 — Post-Conviction)

Overall adult imprisonment rates per 100,000 (all offenses):

• Black: ~1,196
• AIAN: ~1,042 (UM Note: this is the Native American abbreviation Grok used)
• Hispanic: ~349–500 range (varies by state/data year)
• Non-Hispanic White: ~229

[Sirius Lee]

This thread backfired on her bigly. I’ll bet she’s really furious now.

[Uncle Miltie]

Thanks for playing!

Better luck next time!

For anyone following closely, my belief is that we have to:

1) face the fact of excessive black violence,
2) be able to recognize it in public without being shouted down with the word “racist”,
3) offer potential solutions,
4) argue in public in favor of such solutions,
5) legislate solutions,
6) enforce solutions,
7) SO THAT THERE ARE FEWER BLACK VICTIMS!

This is not some academic exercise in moral preening à la Furry. We literally have to be allowed to take the first two steps in order to get to the last step.

So, whenever we have an instance of violence of any kind, it is a symptom of rotted culture. There is rotted culture in every racial group. Let’s be superior human beings for others and look that culture squarely in the eye and propose solutions for it.

As for myself, I have one serious solution:

Welfare causes Fatherlessness causes violent crime, therefor cut and restigmatize welfare. Welfare is a vast ship of maladies foisted on us by the racist LBJ. Let’s have a multi-generational project to reverse his deleterious legacy!

Everyone should always chime in with a SOLUTION. That’s mine. It’ll take at least as long (60+ years) as the development and expression of the malady.

Moral preening against noticing excessive black violence is exactly counterproductive to the solving of the problem. See the steps above. Take these steps, ladies and gentlemen, that we can end this scourge FOR BLACK VICTIMS!

[Uncle Miltie]

Immediately above, for your edification and continued amusement.

[Vigilanteman]

Despite the title of the movie and a few minutes of opening scenes, most of it (including the woodchipper) took place about 150 miles to the east near Brainerd, Minnesota.

[Uncle Miltie]

I moved to Fargo in about 2001. It is not much at all like the movie, which I eventually watched. The accents can be like that, and the comparative innocence of the local mindset are sometimes right. But I’ve never been in a safer place.

In my first week there, I pulled up to a 7-11 on the edge of town, and there was this big old American sedan idling with the windows down, nobody in it, a purse on the front seat with maybe a couple hundred dollars spilled out of it. No worries. The lady was inside getting a coke, and nothing was going to happen. The car and the money were perfectly safe there in the parking lot.

I took this as a hint, and ran a test for the next 7 years. I put a single dollar bill on the top of my cubicle by the aisle, in plain view, easy for any co-worker or night cleaning crew to pocket. When I left I 2008, I picked up that same dollar and left with it.

Which puts me in mind of a song.

James McMurtry
“Out Here in the Middle”

They broke into your car last night,
took the stereo
Now you say you don’t know why
you even live there anymore
The garage man didn’t see a thing,
so you guess it was an inside job
You made a reservation, a table for three
They said you’d have to wait,
somebody must have bribed the maitre’d
Boss got mad and he blamed it all on you
Food was bad and the deal fell through
(chorus)
Well out here in the middle
you can park it on the street
Step up to the counter;
you nearly always get a seat
Nobody steals. Nobody cheats
Wish you were here my love
Wish you here my love
We got tractor pulls and Red Man chew Corporate relo refugees that need love too
we ain’t seen Elvis in a year or two
we got justification for wealth and greed~
Amber waves of grain and bathtub speed
We even got Starbucks
what else you need?
(chorus)
Out here in the middle
Where the center’s on the right
And the ghost of William Jennings Bryan preaches every night
To save the lonely souls
in the dashboard lights
Wish you were here my love
Wish you were here my love
(chorus)
Out here in the middle
Where the buffalo roam
We’re putting up towers for your cell phones
And we screen all applicants
With a fine tooth comb
Wish you were here my love
Wish you were here my love

[blackberry1]

The guy was obviously sick and tired of people making fun of his given name, Royal Rockefeller.

The judge should have mercy on the poor guy. Having a name like that is like serving a life sentence.

[Vigilanteman]

I moved into the Fargo area in 1964 and left for good in 1988. I've been back to visit a couple of times since including my 50th class reunion.

Agree that the natives are nice, but they have had some unsavory move-ins arrive including Omar who graduated from NDSU thanks to reciprocity tuition with Minnesota, where I earned my MBA from MSU on the other side of the Red River.

[Uncle Miltie]

Freaking Somalis brought in by the Catholics and Lutherans are a damned menace up there now.

[SunkenCiv]

https:forum-communications-production-web.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/brightspot/84/be/c9752fce4825a3cc7a6a4b088725/rockefeller-royal.bmp

[Uncle Miltie]

Grok:

Here are specific, documented examples of individuals of Somali descent connected to crimes with a Fargo–Moorhead link (kept concise and factual):

Omar Mohamed Kalmio, a Somali man (then 27), was charged with four murders in North Dakota. 

• He was initially linked to the shooting death of his infant daughter’s mother, Sabrina Zephier.

• Additional charges accused him of being the gunman in the killings of 13-year-old Dylan, along with two other victims.

• Kalmio had a prior history of violent crime.

Suleiman Abdulkadir Ali

Arrested in Fargo (2024)

Charged in a 2013 Minneapolis murder after DNA evidence linked him to the shooting

Abdirashid Bixi Dool

Connected to Moorhead area activity

Charged in a federal fraud scheme involving fraudulent COVID-era meal program claims totaling over $1 million (2025)

Ansar Abdullahi Samatar

Somali national
Arrested on drug-related charges as part of a regional federal operation (2026)

Mohamud Farah Mohamed

Somali national

Had multiple arrests including credit card fraud and drug-related offenses; identified in a Minnesota enforcement operation with regional relevance (2026)

These are examples reported in connection with the Fargo–Moorhead area or involving individuals residing there.

[Chewbarkah]

Good on you for posting actual facts.

“Since release, ...he has accumulated multiple felony and misdemeanor convictions since 2022 for assaults, domestic violence, terrorizing, and drug-related offenses.”

So a guy lunatic transient who had served 20 years for a brutal robbery-murder has multiple misdemeanor and felony convictions SINCE 2022, but was still roaming free to commit this violent assault. The “system” has thoroughly failed the public. The victim needs to “ask” whoever allowed this situation for Million$ in compensation.

[citizen]

Was pretty sure the perp would not be:
a) in a blue metro city; and
b) black

[citizen]

Fury is akin to TexasGator, who some call TeslaGator, as she owns one and is a huge lib/EV fanatic.

If there is a news article about a burning EV auto or bus, TG will find and post pictures of burning ICE cars.

Co-Pilot says the ratio of in-service ICE autos to EV autos is 98% to 2%.

[Zathras]

I’ve been to Fargo many years ago.
Pretty much a quiet boring town.
I’m guessing the Somali moving in are now all over the Minnesota.

[chuckee]

Fargo doesn’t draw a bye. They have their occasional “yutes” violence too.

https://www.valleynewslive.com/2026/03/03/caught-video-teen-injured-group-assault-outside-west-acres-mall/

[Vigilanteman]

The perps on the video sure didn’t look like your typical Fargo area descendents of Scandinavian Lutherans or French-Canadian Catholics. Why do you suppose that is?

[Ray Lomas]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_shooting_of_Fargo_police_officers

I live about 70 miles from Fargo; I have lived in the area for almost 35 years. It is not now the way it used to be then, like so any other areas.