Man found guilty of fatally stabbing Waite Park woman at her apartment​on January 31, 2025 at 3:16 pm

A Stearns County judge found 30-year-old Jarquez J. Bedford guilty of first-degree murder.

​A Stearns County judge found 30-year-old Jarquez J. Bedford guilty of first-degree murder.   

Waite Park police found no signs of forced entry into her apartment, but her phone, wallet, apartment keys and key fob were missing. Surveillance footage shows Cottew entering her apartment building just past noon on Feb. 5, 2023, when a man law enforcement identified as Bedford knocked on the building’s locked entry door. The two talked briefly and then walked together toward the door of the first floor hallway, documents state.