Aeriel Monique Johnson

Aeriel Johnson Timeline

Last Known Apartment Surveillance

Wood Lake Nature Center

Family Advocacy and Concerns

Aeriel’s family has repeatedly asked for transparency, investigative updates, release of available medical records, and a full explanation of how Aeriel traveled from Minneapolis to Wood Lake Nature Center.

• Beverly Johnson has publicly stated that she believes Aeriel’s death involved foul play.
• Family members have said they received limited communication from the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office.
• The family has sought access to the autopsy, toxicology report, death certificate, phone records, email records, and search-warrant information.
• These are family statements and allegations unless supported by official records.

Video 1 Source

My cousin was found deceased on Saturday, October 18th in a pond in Richfield, Minnesota. Please stay to hear her story. We’re trying to raise awareness. We have tried to wait on the police. We have no answers. We have no cause of death. So we’re turning to the public. This will be part one as this is a very long story. I have everything written down. So, if you see me looking down, it’s because I’m trying to make sure that I verbalize this sequence in proper order.

My cousin Ariel Johnson, aged 29,she would have been 30 next month on the 23rd,was found deceased October 18th, 2025 at the Wood Lake Nature Center in Richfield, Minnesota. Ariel was last seen on Friday, October 10th around 7:25 a.m. leaving her apartment building in Minneapolis, Minnesota. We believe that she was headed to work. She did not drive. So, we believe that she got into an Uber or Lyft in this video. However, we’re not able to see the license plate number.

She and her boyfriend live together in the apartment building. They have been together almost 5 years and from what I’m told were engaged. He worked the overnight shift, and he worked Thursday night the night prior, and he was not home when she was leaving out on the video that you see out of her apartment building. So he had not seen her since Thursday, October 9th.

According to the boyfriend’s mom, he did not have work Friday the 10th, which is the same day that we see her leaving out on the video. So we’re kind of unsure why he did not report her missing to her sister until Saturday night, October 11th. Her boyfriend stated that on Friday the 10th, her job called him and stated that she made it to work but disappeared after 1 hour, which is even stranger as to why he did not tell her sister until Saturday night. The job told you she went missing after 1 hour and she didn’t come home Friday night at all. And according to his mother, he did not work that night. So, we don’t understand that.

Her sister ended up reporting her missing to the Minneapolis Police Department, who, in our opinion, did not take the case seriously. They had classified her as a runaway, and the boyfriend had shared with them that 2 years prior she attempted to suicide. However, we have no proof that she ever attempted to suicide. No hospital visits, no conversation ever had about this alleged suicide attempt. So the police,I don’t know if they just looked at her as a mental case,but they told my uncle, her father, when he just mentioned everything that we did know, that it was irrelevant.

On October 13th, which was the Monday following her disappearance, her boyfriend sent a screenshot to one of her sisters stating that he had access to her email and that he came across an email of a receipt from a Walgreens transaction. Now, you know how you can go to Walgreens, you enter your phone number in, you use your rewards, and then it generates a receipt and sends it to your email. He stated that this receipt was in her email.

The receipt had a timestamp of that day, October 13th, at 4:37 p.m.. And the items that were purchased were quite questionable. There was a big sponge, a car air freshener, Oxy stain cleaner, things of that nature. So, my family and I drove to Rockford, Illinois, and demanded that the Rockford police come up to the Walgreens. According to Walgreens, a HIPAA violation prevented them from showing us the video, but the Rockford police were able to view it.

The Rockford police stated that the footage was blurry, but that it appeared to be a Hispanic man who made the purchase, not Ariel. They did provide us with a more descriptive receipt. It did not show a phone number. It did not show a name. It showed that rewards were applied to the entire transaction and to the purchase, and that a debit card was used.

So I texted the boyfriend and asked him to please search through her email, which is where he had found the receipt, for any transactions, past purchases, things of that nature, anything that would show the last four digits of her card number to see if it was a match. He stated that he couldn’t find anything. I asked him if he could give me the password to her email, and he advised me that he did not know it, that her email was just autosaved or merged into his phone. So I asked him to reset the password and share it. He told me he would try and never brought it up again.

At this point, my family goes into overdrive, sharing her missing person’s flyer, trying to raise awareness of her disappearance. I myself tried to get into her Google account which is associated with her phone number. And when I entered “forgot password,” it would show me a phone number to verify, with some characters hidden. I realized it was the boyfriend’s phone number. So, I would enter his number, and it would then generate a code and send it to his phone. I started screenshotting this and sending it to him, letting him know that a code was being sent to his phone and asking him to please share it with me. He stated that he was not receiving the codes.

So on Thursday, October 16th, I talked to the boyfriend via phone. I just asked him blatantly what he thought happened, and he simply said he did not know. No backup statement, no explanation, nothing that he thinks could be the reason why we have no contact with her. And I told him that, with him having been with her for almost 5 years, I would think he knows her on a more personal level than anyone, and he didn’t have any information to give.

He did not generate any flyers. He did not go out looking for her. He was talking about how he was going to work. He did not appear very concerned at all. During that phone call, he asked me something in the nature of, “Well, when you find her, what are you going to do with her?”. And I asked him, “What did he mean by that?”. And he said, “I mean, all of the sisters and the cousins like what are you guys going to do with her?”. And I didn’t understand the context of the question. And I just said to him, “Well, right now the goal is simply to find her.”.

But that question left me feeling very uneasy because if she did have a mental breakdown and went to an institution, then there’s nothing to do with her. And if she up and left him, then there’s nothing to do with her. So, that question didn’t sit right with me. And yeah, I’m going to have to do a part two.

Video 2 Source

Below is the transcript of the video regarding the Family investigation into the death of Ariel Johnson:

All right. So, I’m doing my part two on the missing person’s case and the death investigation of my cousin Ariel Johnson. I have learned many details since my first video. I’m going to try to put this all in 10 minutes, but it is indeed a lot. Um, so I left off by saying that her boyfriend, I’m going to call him Jacob. Um, Jacob had said to me on a phone call prior to her being found, “What are we going to do with her when we find her?”. And so, I didn’t like the question. It didn’t make sense to me. If she left you, then she left you. There’s nothing to do with her. If she had a mental breakdown and she’s in the institution, then she’s getting the help she needs. Once again, there’s nothing to do with her. So, that statement alone made me feel like he was referring to a body. It made me feel uneasy. So, I began calling medical examiners in the area, asking them if they had unidentified bodies and if they were to get one to give me a call because it just didn’t sit right in my spirit.

As a result, I did receive a call the night of October 18th around 10 p.m. from the Hennepin Medical Examiner office stating that they had found a body in the Woodlake Nature Center that morning that they felt was my cousin Ariel. Um, they said they had also seen my Facebook post about a Minnesota missing persons case that included a description of her body, and they felt it was a match. Um, after speaking with them, I confirmed the clothing she was wearing in the video I shared in my first video, and they confirmed it was a match. Her body was unrecognizable and it had been stated that her body had been in the water at least 5 days or longer.

Upon finding her body, uh, Jacob decides to call many of her siblings the next day, telling all of them that it was suicide. Mind you, the medical examiner did not suggest this. Police did not suggest this. This is him telling everybody it’s suicide. The day after her body was found, unwarranted and at random. In my phone conversation with him following her body being found, I asked him to expound on that theory. Body and pond for me do not correlate with suicide. I want you to paint the picture. She does not drive. She Ubered and Lyfted everywhere. So, are you saying she took an Uber or a Lyft to the Woodlake Nature Center and jumped in the water?. Explain it, paint the picture, and make it make sense to me, because I don’t see how that’s the first thing that came to your mind.

But he had told some of their mutual associates as well that it was suicide and that the sheriff’s department told him that. So they said that’s what they said. He said he had also said it to me too. They didn’t say the medical examiner and the sheriff told him that, but he told me it was suicide. Why are you saying that, sir?. Why are you saying that?. Who told you that?. Why is that the first thing you’re running with?.

However, prior to her body being found, um, I believe I shared in the first video that I was trying to get into her Samsung account to try to access her location. He had access to her Gmail. So, I was like, “Why can’t you give us the password, reset the password so we can look through the email, you know, maybe that’ll help us locate where she is or get some information on, you know, what could have happened?” Um, every time I try to reset the password, a two-step verification code goes to his phone, which he says he isn’t receiving.

Um yeah, same thing with her bank account. He told me she had an Acorns bank account. Um, we were trying to reset the password to get in to see her last transaction. Anything that could suggest where she was, this is prior to her being found. And he told me, um, he would try and never followed up with me. But if you have access to the email, then the password reset goes to the email. You can reset whatever. Um, yeah, he was not trying to help us get access to anything.

And her sister, um, kept trying to retrieve her laptop from him, but he would not give it up. He kept saying, “He doesn’t think anything is on it. There’s nothing on it”. Nobody asked you that. They just said they wanted the laptop. Sir, why are you refusing to give it up?. Just being weird.

Um, on November 21st, I went to Minnesota to assist two of her sisters in going to her apartment, where Jacob lived with her, to retrieve her belongings. Because he had shared with her sister that he had already boxed her things up and that she would only get what he wanted her to have. As if he’s her husband, as if he’s next of kin. You do not get to decide what her family gets to keep. If anything, it is vice versa. They will decide what you can have. Hello.

So, um we went there and um,oh, child. Okay. We went there, and, um, he did indeed have a few of her items in a box. Uh but there were still a closet full of things. Um, the place was a pigsty, and um, all of a sudden, the laptop that her sister once tried to get,he doesn’t know where it is. The laptop just disappeared. Um we looked around, did not see the laptop. Um, gathered as many of her things as we could, and, uh, prior to leaving, I decided to interrogate him a bit about, once again, what happened or what he thinks happened.

So, prior to um kind of interrogating him a little bit on what he thinks happened, um I decided to go ahead and send that Google verification code to his phone once again that he kept claiming that he was not getting. In person, because you’re not going to deny me in person. But instead of sending him a text, I had to make a phone call. So that way, I’m right there to hear the phone ring. And you can’t deny that you received it. And sure enough, his phone rang. He answered it and I said, “Yep, that’s Google verification”. And he was visibly shaking. Shaking.

I got the code, got into the email, and the things that we found in the email is very clear why he didn’t want us to get into the email, and I’m going to share them all on here. These things have been shared with the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Department. They are still not telling us anything. Um, we don’t know where they are at in the investigation. We don’t know if they have any suspects. We don’t know what they’re looking into. We don’t know anything. They haven’t shared anything with us. Um, but all of these things that I will be sharing, I did tell them that I would share on a public platform if they did not give us any type of update, which they have not.

So, here is a screenshot of me trying to get the verification code from him to get into her Samsung account, which he claimed he wasn’t receiving, blah blah. And then I’m going to show what we found in the email. So you see that I’m asking about the Samsung blah blah, and that was October 15th. This is October 15th. We got access to her email. He went in and reset the password after I brought it up to him. Once again, this is from her email. October 16th. “Your password has been reset”. The same day I was trying to get into it.

Now, here, on October 16th, I asked him, “How do you have access to your email?” He explains to me that their accounts are merged. Very important for later. It’s going to be a part three because I see I only have about a minute left. Very important. He said that. And also, this is from her email. October 21st, 11:45 a.m. Someone, mind you, she was found deceased on October 18th, reset her Acorns password. She was already deceased. Then we saw in her email again, on October 23rd, that someone had reset the password. She’s already deceased. Found on the 18th of October.

Video 3 Source

This is a transcript regarding the Family investigation into the death of Ariel Johnson:

Part three on my cousin, Ariel Johnson, being found unalive at the Wood Lake Nature Center in Richfield, Minnesota. I left off on part two of showing screenshots from her email that we had finally gotten access to after attempting many times to get in her email to reset the password to get access to her bank accounts. Anything that we can access that would give us answers. This was before she was found. The two-step verification for her email account was linked to her boyfriend’s phone number. He claimed he was not receiving the verification codes, but when we were there in person to retrieve her belongings, he could not deny the code.

So, with that, we finally gained access to her email account, which revealed a lot. Her bank account password had been changed. Her email password had been changed. Her Samsung account we were trying to get into, that password had been changed the same day that I inquired about us trying to get access to it through Jacob, the boyfriend.

So, I’m going to share because I did record some while we were there, retrieving her things. I decided to take that as an opportunity to ask him a few questions about what he thinks happened. And I’m going to share that.

“All I know is the day that she left, she woke me up, said goodbye, and she left for work”.

“So, you were home when she left Friday morning”.

“I guess that’s what Iam that’s what I’ve been saying”.

“I was asleep because I just got off of a shift at that 7:25 that morning already”.

“Wait a minute”.

“Yeah, they sure are leaving up this floor at 25 that morning. Yeah. So, you probably weren’t here yet”.

So, she was found October 18th that morning in the pond at the Wood Lake Nature Center. The following day, the boyfriend called her siblings and told all of them that she died by suicide. We had also heard from mutual associates that he had told them as well that the sheriff department or the medical examiner told him that it was suicide. This was literally a day or two after she was found. There were no sources to support or confirm that it was a suicide. So, it’s like, why do you keep saying that?

I asked him to explain it,like, paint the picture for me. How is it suicide? He said itself that they Ubered and Lyft everywhere. So I asked, I mean, so she took an Uber to the Wood Lake Nature Center and jumped in the water? Does it make sense? So it’s important to note that at this nature center, it is busy. There are people pushing strollers, there are people jogging, there are people riding bikes. It’s a whole little trail.

And the activity on her phone ceased around 10:00 a.m. on October 10th, the day she went missing; there’s no more activity on her phone. So, if she had, quote-unquote, “unalived” herself, how could she have done it in the middle of the morning while everybody’s walking the trail, jogging the trail, pushing strollers? It does not align. It doesn’t make sense.

It also doesn’t correlate because had she taken an Uber or a Lyft to the Wood Lake Nature Center and actually jumped in the water that morning in front of everybody, why would it have taken 8 days for her body to surface? She went missing on October 10th. She was found on October 18th.

Here’s another brief audio from the visit when we went to retrieve her things.

“Familiar with her ever going to the Wood Lake nature?”

“No, we don’t. She had a torn meniscus in her knees. We don’t walk anywhere. We take Ubers wherever we go”.

“You think she’s walking?”

“I don’t know what you believe”.

“She doesn’t know big time”.

What’s interesting about what he said is that he said they don’t walk anywhere. She has a torn meniscus in her knee. He’s never been there himself. He doesn’t know her to be associated with this place. The thing is, if you’ve never been there and you just know it’s a pond, how do you know it’s not just a simple pond you can park by and walk up to, right there? This place ”I went up there after we left from retrieving her belongings. It was creepy. It was eerie and there is indeed a walk about a good six, maybe seven minutes before you even reach the water. He said “we don’t walk anywhere”. “I don’t even know how she would know about this place,” as if he knew there was a walk associated with this place. This is the Wood Lake Nature Center in Richfield, Minnesota.

I put this video in five times the speed. It is a trail and, as I said, it’s about a good six to seven-minute walk before you even approach the water. The energy was very thick, felt eerie and creepy just to be on those grounds. This is not a walk that I see someone doing with a torn meniscus. Finally, about to approach where the water is. As I said, the energy was just so heavy. It was so heavy. Very hard to be there knowing that’s where she was found.

So, as I mentioned in my last video, I have a screenshot of a text message between Jacob and me in which he personally told me that their Google accounts were merged. Because we finally had access to her Gmail, we were able to see her emails and her Google activity. Again, he said their accounts were merged, so this would be activity shared amongst his phone and hers.

She went missing on October 10th. There was no activity on her phone after about 10:00 a.m. that morning, and she was found on October 18th. So when looking at the Google activity, this is what we found. I filtered it to show Google Maps searches from October 10th through the 14th, and this is what it produced. October 10th, she went missing. Someone searched “Wood Lake Nature Center back entrance” that morning in another park. And then someone searches “Wood Lake Nature Center back entrance” again twice on the 14th through Google Maps.

All of this information has been shared with the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Department. They have not given us any details regarding this case. We do not know what information they already have or what they have investigated. Last we were told, there were no suspects, no persons of interest. We are betting our bottom dollar that she was drugged and then drowned. We were told the cause of death was freshwater drowning, but it was undetermined or inconclusive because they don’t know how she ended up in the water.

They’re refusing to give us access to the autopsy or the toxicology. We don’t even have a death certificate. We have tried emailing, calling, and reaching out. Just tell us something. Let us know where you are in the investigation. Absolutely nothing. No details, nothing. So, we’re asking the public to blow up the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Department. I will be sharing the detective’s information and just help us raise awareness. Justice for Ariel Johnson. We will continue to say her name until we get answers.

I think I will ask God why for the rest of my life and never will I come to understand it. Even if God himself came in front of me and told me the.

Case Images

Case Records

• Richfield Police incident report.
• Hennepin County Sheriff’s investigative file.
• CAD and 911 records.
• Medical Examiner investigative report.
• Autopsy and toxicology reports.
• Death certificate.
• Search-warrant applications and returns for phone and email records.

No complete official investigative file or autopsy report has been publicly posted in the materials currently included on this page.

Current Public Status

• The Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office has been publicly identified as the lead investigative agency.
• Aeriel’s publicly disclosed cause and manner of death remain limited in the available materials.
• No suspect, person of interest, arrest, or criminal charge has been publicly announced in the materials included on this page.
• The family continues to seek additional records, answers, and investigative transparency.