The owners of a Wright County equestrian boarding and training farm are expressing frustration at the process and recent outcome of a 2024 trespassing case that left five suspects with nearly zero accountability after horses were disturbed and put in danger. One of the suspects even became involved in a gang-related shootout a few months later while the trespassing case played out.
In September 2024, five Somali males were caught and stopped by the owners of the private property in Buffalo, Minn., that contains a residence and professional horse boarding farm. The property was posted with no trespassing signs, the charging documents state.
The owners blocked the suspects from leaving until law enforcement arrived. The males, three adults and two juveniles, were each ticketed with misdemeanor trespassing at the time.
The males admitted to the responding deputy that they jumped the fence and entered a closed horse barn. The suspects said they wanted to make a video of them riding horses for social media, and one of the juveniles showed the deputy a video of him riding one of the horses.
The owners said filming the boarded horses on their property was not allowed, so the juvenile immediately deleted the video at their request. The complaints state that the males admitted to making a poor decision to enter the property and disturb the horses.
The farm owners told the deputy that a bridle was placed backwards on one of the horses, causing risk of injuries to the horse’s eyes. The suspects had also wrapped a nylon lead around the horse’s front legs, causing risk of injury, and one of the horses had its fly mask removed. The complaint states that the farm owners interrupting the suspects during the trespass prevented injury to the horses.
After the deputy called and notified the parents of the two juveniles, who lived in Minneapolis, that they’d been ticketed with a crime, all suspects were allowed to leave.
The police report, complaints, and information Alpha News received from the property owners state that following conversations between law enforcement, prosecutors, and the property owners — who said their property was an agricultural facility and expressed concern for the horses being “molested” and at great risk of injury during the incident — a gross misdemeanor charge of trespassing was added to the adult cases.
Charges and outcome
The adults charged were Abdullahi Mahamud Abdullahi, 19, of Burnsville; Khalid Mahdi Ali, 18, of Minneapolis; and Sakariye Bashier Nur, 18, of St. Louis Park.
Based on details available in court and public records and a subsequent case involving a gang-related shootout in Cedar-Riverside in January 2025, Crime Watch Minneapolis was able to determine that one of the juveniles charged was Bilal Abdi Farah, who is now age 19, of Minneapolis. The other juvenile was only identified in court documents as A.M., born in 2007, with a parent living in south Minneapolis at the same address as Bilal Abdi Farah.
The three adult trespassing cases were resolved in February of this year with the gross misdemeanor trespassing counts being dismissed in each case, and each suspect receiving a stay-of-adjudication on the remaining misdemeanor charge. This means the cases are hidden from publicly available searches by name. The adult offenders were placed on probation for a term of one year. Records for the juvenile trespassing cases were not immediately available.
The farm owners reached out to Alpha News expressing frustration with delays in the court process and having to badger the prosecuting attorney to upgrade the charges at the beginning of the case.
“We house two older horses that do therapy work for their owners. And we own two high-value show horses of our own. We’ve been here since 1997 and have spent our lives building this farm. My peace of mind is long gone,” one of the owners told Alpha News.
The offenders were also ordered to write letters of apology to the victims within 60 days, but the farm owners say that hasn’t been completed.
The farm owner, who is also a prominent figure in the Minnesota equine community, expressed frustration that more attention wasn’t given to the trespassing case given the prevalence of horse farms in Wright County. However, the University of Minnesota Extension subsequently published an article about safeguarding horse farms after word spread in the community.
Other cases
Public information and court records revealed that Bilal Abdi Farah was charged in February 2025 with second-degree assault for a gang-related shootout in Cedar-Riverside on Jan. 27, 2025. In that case, charges describe that Farah, an associate of the “Muddy” gang — a Somali Outlaws offshoot — got into a shootout with a gang rival, Feysal Jama Ali, an associate of the “1627 Boyz” Somali gang.
The criminal complaint against Farah also mentioned that Farah was a suspect in an earlier shooting on Jan. 21, 2025, in the Whittier neighborhood of Minneapolis that left four people injured in a barrage of gunfire. Farah does not appear to have been charged in that case at this time.
Farah was just sentenced last month in the second-degree assault case and was granted a downward departure from sentencing guidelines by Judge Sarah West. At sentencing, Farah’s 36-month prison sentence was stayed, and he was instead ordered to serve 180 days in the workhouse, to commence on April 17, 2026. Farah will only be required to serve two-thirds or less of that time incarcerated, will be allowed furloughs for treatment, therapy, and job seeking, and is expected to be placed on probation for three years.
Adult trespassing suspect Abdullahi Mahamud Abdullahi has several prior court cases and convictions, including one case from October 2023 in which Abdullahi was originally charged with fourth-degree assault motivated by bias, fifth-degree assault, and disorderly conduct. Charges in that case say that Abdullahi and a group of teens assaulted a “trans”-identified male outside a Plymouth, Minn., restaurant. The group yelled and screamed profanities, including “bitch, fag, faggot, trans‐bitch, and the ‘n word,’” charges state, while at least two in the group physically assaulted the victim by kicking and punching him as he lay on the ground.
Abdullahi was ultimately offered a plea deal by the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office in the case, which agreed to dismiss the bias crime assault charge and the disorderly conduct charge. Abdullahi pleaded guilty to fifth-degree assault. In June 2024, he received a stayed 90-day sentence and was placed on probation for one year. He was still on probation at the time of the trespassing case a few months later.
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Minnesota Crime Watch & Information publishes news, info and commentary about crime, public safety and livability issues in Minneapolis, the Twin Cities and Greater Minnesota.
Crime Watch MN
Minnesota Crime Watch & Information publishes news, info and commentary about crime, public safety and livability issues in Minneapolis, the Twin Cities and Greater Minnesota.
