The nightmare begins
In 2018, Judy Johnson and her sister, Linda Rolfe, decided to sell their late mother’s home. The Normanna Township property is located on six acres of land between the two sisters’ homes. Judy and her husband Russ lived in a home on one side of the property, and Linda and her husband Jim lived on the other. All three homes shared a private road off of East Pioneer Road. The Big Sucker Creek ran through their backyards.
Before selling the house, the sisters installed a new septic mound system, at a cost of $24,000. They also installed new flooring throughout the house and included many appliances in the sale, including a washer, dryer, refrigerator, and stove.
The house underwent three separate inspections before the sale closed—allowing interested buyer Adam Wolf ample time to familiarize himself with the property.
Because the Johnsons and Rolfes were elderly and did not want to be responsible for any further work on the property, they decided to sell the property “as is.” The $250,000 purchase agreement stated:
The Property is being sold in its existing condition. Buyer acknowledges that the Property, including all improvements, is being sold on an ‘As-is’ and ‘Where-is’ basis, with all existing faults. Prior to closing, buyer will make such inspections of the Property as are consistent with the terms of this Purchase Agreement in order to satisfy Buyer as to the condition of the Property … Buyer will be deemed to have accepted the condition of the Property subject to this Purchase Agreement as satisfactory to Buyer, and Seller shall have no liability with respect to the condition of such Property. Buyer waives any claims related in any way to the condition of this Property.
At the sale closing, on Nov. 18, 2018, Adam Wolf’s wife, Kari, had reservations about the location. She thought it was too isolated. “It’s too far,” Kari Wolf said, according to Judy Johnson’s recollection. “I don’t want to live out there.” Nevertheless, Adam proceeded to sign the “As-is” agreement, as if his wife hadn’t spoken.
“He didn’t listen to her one bit,” Johnson told the Monitor. “He just went ahead and signed the papers. And my sister and I both looked at each other and thought, ‘This isn’t good.’ He didn’t care what she was saying.”
Shortly after moving in, Wolf began to complain about the location of the septic system and items which hadn’t been removed from the property. Wolf said the septic system had been installed in the wrong location. The sisters quickly learned that Wolf did not listen to anything anyone else had to say, and that he tended to express himself by screaming and swearing. He drank heavily, which exacerbated his abrasive demeanor.
In 2019, Wolf began clear-cutting trees on his property—which the sisters were aware was his right—but they thought he might not recognize the value of some of the trees. In the spring of 2019, Judy’s brother-in-law Donald approached Wolf and suggested that the plum trees might be worth saving, because they bore delicious fruit. Adam said, “No one tells me what to do!” and promptly cut down the plum orchard as well. He also felled a row of red pines between his and Judy Johnson’s yards, completely eliminating the vegetative screening between their houses. Wolf spent that summer burning the trees he had removed, filling the neighborhood with smoke.
The Rolfes were able to maintain a barrier between their home and Wolf’s, because the screening trees between their homes had been planted on their property.
Wolf did have moments of neighborliness. One day, while Judy was working in her garden, Wolf came over and gave her a glass of iced tea, which she thought was a nice gesture. The very next day, however, Judy and Russ came home to find Wolf piling trash along the property line—tree stumps and branches, old window frames from a chicken coop he had burned, a mattress, a roll of linoleum, pallets, cement blocks, junk that he emptied out of his semi truck. As the pile grew, Wolf told the Johnsons that it was his “monument.” He added, “It will be there longer than any of you.”
Wolf repeatedly insisted that it was the Johnsons’ and Rolfes’ responsibility to remove the junk he had set along on the property line. He also began to grow increasingly furious about his septic system.
On Aug. 7, 2019, Wolf sent Judy Johnson the following email (none of the emails included in this article have been edited for spelling or grammar):
Hi Judy, as I am sure you are aware, there are outstanding issues for this property concerning truck and trailer loads of trash.
I have removed no less than three truck and trailer loads at my expense.
I would like you and Jim and Linda to be as proactive as possible and remove the rest of your trash (ALL OF IT!) from the property.
ALL OF IT!!!
Please do so immediately so we may begin discussions on how you intend to rectify the septic placement that you did in breach of contract.
If there is a reasonable decision made then we may continue our neighborly relationship.
ALL OF THE TRASH ON THE PROPERTY MUST BE REMOVED IMMEDIATELY!!!
I NEVER AGREED TO PLACEMENT OF THE SEPTIC SYSTEM.
Please resolve these issues immediately to avoid sn uhhhhhhh legal confrontation.
Even though Judy knew the trash was not her responsibility to remove, she agreed to have it removed in an effort to placate Wolf. She didn’t give in to all of his demands:
Respectfully but firm…
- You signed “as is” on the house contract.
- County decides where septic had to be.
- I will remove any trash on your property as quickly as I can!!!
Wolf replied:
I NEVER AGREED TO THE PLACEMENT OF THE SEPTIC!!!!!!
The placement deteriorates front the property values signigantly….WHY WAS THIS DONE IN DECEMBER IN BREACH OF CONTRACT INSTEAD OF JUNE THAT WAS CONTRACTUALLY AGREED UPON…???
RIDICULOUS!!!!
I NEVER AGREED TO THOSE
I NEVER AGREED THAT 50 PLUS TRUCKLOADS OF MATERIAL WOULD HAVE TO BE DEPOSITED MY BACKYARD!!!!
KNOWONE WOULD EVER AGREE TO THAT..
This is something that was cone without my knowledge …
PLEASE SHOW ME A SINGLE DOCUMENT THAT SPECIFICALLY DESIGNATES THIS SALE AS (AS IS)..
Your position of—well, you just should have known better tells me, AND MY WIFE that you were AND ARE fully aware of all of the trash on the property and you are knowingly selling years of your garbage to an unknowing perspective buyer…
YOU AND THE ROLFS KNEW FULL WELL THE MOUNTAINS OF TRASH ON THE PROPERTY AND YOU ALSO ACTED IN BREACH OF CONTRACT ABOUT THE SEPTIC.
I NEVER AGREED TO ANY IF THIS!!!
I NEVER AGREED TO THE LOCATION OF THE S4PTIC INDTALL..!
I WAS NEVER ASKED TO INSPECT ANY OF THE INDTALL OR THE PLACEMENT!
I NEVER AGREED TO 50 PLUS TRUCKLOADS OF MATERIAL THAT WOULD BE DUMPED IN MY BACKYARD!!!!
YOU, THE SELLERS ARE RESPONSIBLE AND LIABLE FOR YOUR ACTIONS UNDER BREACH OF CONTRACT!!!!!!!
On three occasions, the Johnsons furnished Wolf with signed copies of their As-is contract, none of which were acknowledged.
At night, Wolf would get drunk, and howl and yip. He would also scream curses at his neighbors. These were heard by other neighbors, some distance away, on the opposite side of Big Sucker Creek. On one occasion, the Johnsons called the sheriff’s office to request a wellness check on Wolf, because he could be heard screaming “Oh, no! Oh, no!” so horrendously that they believed he had been hurt.
After the deputies determined that Wolf was okay and departed, Wolf cursed his neighbors. The following day, he set a target up near the Rolfes’ property line and began practicing his shooting.
In August of 2020, Judy and Russ Johnson contracted to have a privacy fence built along the property line between their home and Wolf’s. When the contractor was on site, measuring for the job, Wolf drove over on his lawnmower and screamed, “Get rid of your goddamn trash!” The contractor was taken aback by the encounter and suggested that the sheriff be present during the fence installation.
True to their word, the Johnsons and the Rolfes removed Wolf’s monument of trash. Instead of placating Wolf, he became angrier. The day after the trash was removed, he mocked Judy and Russ Johnson for allowing their children to help them with the project. They heard him shouting, “Judy, you had to have your kids remove the trash. Unbelievable! You raised a ******. Your husband is a *********, and you (or your husband) are going to jail!”
Wolf also frequently parked his semi truck near the Johnsons’ home and left it idling for hours, with the lights on and pointed at the Johnsons’ home. It filled the vicinity with diesel fumes (and noise), and prevented them from enjoying themselves on their deck.
On Sept. 10, 2020, Judy Johnson petitioned for a harassment restraining order (HRO) against Wolf. She spoke of his violent temper and erratic behavior, as well as the vicious, homophobic names he called her son. The HRO was granted for six months.
On Jan. 4, 2021, Russ Johnson passed away.
In March of 2021, despite the fact that Judicial Referee John Schulte declined to extend Judy Johnson’s protective order, Adam Wolf wrote a rambling letter of complaint to the Minnesota Board of Judicial Standards, accusing the referee of “falsif[ying] court records, legal documents, oath accountability, negligence, and criminal activity.” Wolf took no responsibility for any of his disturbing actions, claiming he was being punished for his views on homosexuality.
[I]s everyone in the U.S. entitled to the same rights? Of course, but your rights do not extend to forcing me to comply with what you or anyone else want me to call you! …. That’s NOT the way our society or our legal system works. If you’re wondering whether or not Mr. Schulte has gone woke, you can consider that question answered for good, and that should greatly concern you … This is nothing more than a brazen example of cancel culture, and it is disgusting. Disgusting is usually hyperbole, but in this case it is an understatement. I never thought I would live to see the day that those that believe in two genders are too extreme for the ruling woketopians. He has done away with free speech and replaced it with his own hobby-horse like woke and caustic cancel culture … Do we have free speech when only others who don’t like what was said can decide what can be said? … This is a court of law; it is not a court of cancel culture, nor is it a court of the woke culture, nor is it a court of the extreme left activist where everyone who does not comply must be ruined.
Again, Judicial Referee Schulte had chosen not to extend Judy Johnson’s protective order—but Wolf appears to have become enraged with the referee during his court hearings.
On May 31, 2021, during a family gathering at Judy Johnson’s home, Adam Wolf texted Linda Rolfe the following message: “Isn’t it great to spend the Holidays with family.” He included a picture of Russ Johnson sitting in a window of the house with a pair of binoculars. Russ (who had passed four months earlier) was a 100 percent disabled veteran. He was also legally blind, so he used binoculars to view things at a distance. At some point, before Russ passed, Adam Wolf had stood in the Johnsons’ driveway and captured a photo of Russ peering out of his window.
Wolf had produced a life-size print of the photo and posted it on the door to his garage, in plain view of passersby.
In April of 2022, Kari Wolf divorced Adam.
On May 20, 2022, Wolf called 911 to complain about the Rolfes’ yard lights, which he claimed were now brighter and pointed directly at his house. When sheriff’s deputies investigated, the Rolfes told them that nothing had changed in regard to their lights.
On July 6, 2022, Adam Wolf petitioned for harassment restraining orders against Judy Johnson, Linda Rolfe, and Jim Rolfe. He accused them of pointing video cameras at his house, spying on him with binoculars, “driving by the house multiple times,” stalking him, and making fraudulent 911 calls to harass him.
“These sisters are doing anything they can to try to get me to move,” Wolf wrote. “They will not stop!”
Johnson and the Rolfes denied Wolf’s accusations, but agreed to abide by the HRO and refrain from any future contact with Wolf.
On July 25, 2022, Johnson and the Rolfes applied for their own HROs against Wolf. Judy described Wolf’s behavior:
Ongoing howling like a wolf, barking like a dog, using middle finger as he cut down trees at the end of my fence and shouted, “Another one down.” Called out to me driving on our road, “Fuck you, scumbag.” Target shooting too close to neighbors. Calling out “oh, no” several times and 3 households thought he was hurt. Call 911: deputy said he was drinking and singing …
This summer, Adam has parked his semi next to my driveway for 3-4 days in a row 3-4 times. His last time, he let the semi run, day and night, for 4 days in a row. July 1-5. Very uncomfortable for me and friends and family were frightened. Why? …
Adam will not stop harassing until he faces some consequences. He never will admit he is wrong for his erratic behavior, his wrong perceptions, and he never lets go of a grudge … He will not try to listen to his neighbors. The first HRO did help me but Adam still doesn’t take responsibility for his erratic behavior. He asks for attention by accusing me of untrue facts.
All three restraining orders were granted.
Enter the voodoo doll
On July 1, 2023, Adam Wolf called 911 to report that Judy Johnson had hung a “tin can voodoo doll” in a tree, which was “looking at his property.” He wanted it removed. “Tell her to stop stalking me with her cameras and voodoo dolls,” Wolf told dispatch. “Get an officer out here to get that shit out of my face.”
The “voodoo doll” was an approximately 24-inch-tall yard ornament, which a friend of Judy’s had made for her years earlier from recycled materials. When Judy noticed that the tin man had fallen from his branch, she relocated him to a new branch in a different tree, near the end of her privacy fence—and thereby drew Wolf’s paranoid attention.
Deputies received a second 911 call 45 minutes later from Jim and Linda Rolfe. Deputy Sean Clarke’s report notes follow:
Linda Rolfe told me that Adam Wolf was screaming “Fuck you, Judy!” … Linda Rolfe noted that he was repeatedly mowing the area along the border of Wolf’s and Johnson’s yard and screaming. Linda Rolfe stated that the screaming and swearing was clearly directed at Johnson. Linda Rolfe went outside and held her phone out near her yard, and I could eventually hear Wolf making high pitched yipping sounds. Linda Rolfe told me that he was now making loud fake laughing sounds …
Upon arrival, I located Wolf on his lawn mower … I greeted Wolf, and he explained to me his frustrations about the camera located on Johnson’s property. Wolf was clearly still angry that no one would take down the camera for him. I asked Wolf about the tin can decoration that he initially called about. Wolf didn’t seem to like that I was changing the subject, but then began to explain that he didn’t know what it was and was concerned that there may be cameras inside of it. I explained to Wolf that we had complaints about him making noise in his yard. Wolf stated, “Me making noise in the yard is me making noise in the yard. There is times that I do that.” Wolf claimed that he was singing along to different videos, and he displayed headphones that he was using to listen to items on his phone. I told Wolf that he was reported to be screaming directly at Johnson. Wolf admitted that he said this to Johnson and yelled it where others may be able to hear him. After mentioning this, Wolf stated, “I hope that doesn’t put me in jail.”
Wolf’s admission that he had yelled at Johnson was probable cause for the deputies to arrest him for violating an HRO. As he was being loaded into the squad car, Wolf yelled at Judy Johnson, “Yeah, nice one, sunshine!” in front of deputies—another violation.
When investigators reviewed videos from Judy Johnson’s and the Rolfes’ security cameras, they observed Wolf violating his HROs multiple times.
In one of the videos, Wolf is seen turning his body around so he can look into Johnson’s yard and then screaming, “You don’t own it, Judy!” Wolf is frequently screaming “Fucking queer!” or “******!” and he often cups his hand over his mouth so that the sound would reflect towards Johnson’s yard. Wolf is heard mocking Johnson by screaming, “Call 911.” Wolf then continues to make mocking, laughing sounds as he rides around on his lawnmower …
In one video, Wolf is heard screaming, “You don’t own it, I own it.” Another video captures Wolf screaming, “You don’t fucking own it.” A third video again captures Wolf screaming, “You don’t fucking own it! Get that in your head, you don’t fucking own it! I own it! Not you! Get it through your fucking head! I’m not leaving! I fucking own it!” A fourth video captures Wolf repeatedly screaming, “Fucking ****** ass! Fucking moron! I own it, not you!” …
There are 14 police reports between July of 2019 and November of 2022 in which Wolf is involved in a neighborhood disturbance which resulted in a police report. There are even more 911 calls that were generated involving Wolf, but no report was ever completed. Wolf often is the reporting person of the complaints, and he focuses his attention to Johnson. When law enforcement contacts Wolf he is confrontational and irrational. Over time, Wolf has become more irrational and is escalating his behavior.
Wolf spent six days in jail, before bonding out and pleading not guilty. On July 9, 2023, Wolf sent a letter to St. Louis County Sheriff Gordon Ramsay, complaining that Ramsay’s officers were biased and that they were allowing his elderly neighbors to mistreat him.
My neighbors are sisters each approximately eighty years of age that are the epitome of what intrusive is and seemingly they will stop at nothing. I have attached a partial list of over twenty five separate harassment occurrences including numerous false alarm 911 calls, some absolutely bizarre. In each case the sheriffs will not issue them a citation, not for anything! Not for false and frivolous emergency calls. Not for false 911 fire alarms. Not for multiple harassments phone calls and messages to my wife. Not for harassing the contractors that were hired for home improvement and landscaping. Not for continuing to drive by the house multiple times a day and spy. Not for directing spotlights at my house at all hours of the night. Not for not putting a shroud on an incredibly bright light which lights up my entire back yard. Not for illegally spying on me with binoculars as they sit mostly naked and I am in my yard. Not for illegally spying on me in my yard with video camera pointed directly at me and my house. The list goes on and on and not one time did an officer issue a single citation to them …
I had spent the last week of June doing yard work when I experienced possibly the most bizarre form of harassment. In addition to Judy’s video surveillance camera she had hung what can only be described as some type of tin can voodoo doll in a tree at the edge of the fence line pointed directly at me, my yard, and my house. This is not yard art, and it is not a garden figurine. It was specifically put in a tree deliberately directed at me …
It pains me to make these claims, Sheriff Ramsay, but your officers are biased and corrupt and clearly unethical. They do not apply the law equally and in most cases they don’t even respond or apply the law at all. As you can clearly see, no sheriff is going to issue a citation to an 80 year old lady regardless of what they do. Concerning character, morals and ethics their pride and egos are easily bruised and when confronting them with facts and logic and literal written law instead of learning from it and enforcing it they become like bitter scolded children, jaded and biased against the accuser …
Rabid homophobia
On Oct. 10, 2023, Johnson and the Rolfes filed for new HROs against Adam Wolf. Their cases were assigned to Judicial Referee Jessica Fralich.
On Jan. 3, 2024, Adam Wolf sent eleven emails to Referee Fralich over the course of three hours. The first one, with “Unbelievable!” in the subject line, read as follows:
Dear referee. With the greatest respect to the bench, its authority and oversight.
I have complied with the court’s orders to respond and I have put forth all the effort that it deserves. Unbelievable that I should even have to do so. It’s amazing to me that a District Court has been put through the paces and has villainized me and made me have to even defend myself. One issue that keeps coming up is the apparent court’s position of how terrible I am and how I am so wrong about my beliefs concerning queers. Yes you read that correctly, queers. No again madam justice I am not wrong in my beliefs and it is truly unsettling that any representative of the state of Minnesota would even attempt to badger me and barrate me in a court hearing for not agreeing with the trendy viewpoint.
Another email Wolf wrote to Fralich (bearing homophobic slurs in the subject line) read:
My belief system is concrete in the knowledge of understanding that the disgusting putred filth of homosexuality rooted in such acts is not OK …
I’ll remain heterosexual and not promote or accept homosexuality thank you as I have no desire to accept another man’s ***** ******** ***** into, well, you get the idea…
No no lady justice. NO homosexuality is acceptable under any circumstances. May I be so bold as to suggest that you may want to reevaluate your position …
Screw you!
Queers and ******* are what you support and promote???
Referee Fralich granted all three HROs against Wolf on Jan. 5, 2024, ordering him to have no contact with Jim or Linda Rolfe for two years and none with Judy Johnson for five years.
In a memo attached to her order for Judy Johnson, Referee Fralich dismissed Wolf’s claims of innocence:
Petitioner credibly testified to the ongoing fear and anxiety Respondent’s behaviors have caused her. Petitioner further testified to an incident that had occurred within the prior two months, in which Petitioner observed Respondent look at her and make a gesture that she described as a throat-slashing motion, whereby Respondent used his hand and drew it across his throat. Petitioner believed that to be a threat towards her and was frightened.
Respondent’s defense was not that he didn’t make the statements … [He] fully acknowledged his use of the slurs as recorded in the videos, but [argued] that he is free to do or say what he wants on his property, that he hears worse things in public, and that he was simply mowing his lawn and making noise that was not directed at anyone in particular. Respondent did deny making any type of throat-slashing gesture. Respondent’s claims that he was not directing his comments towards Petitioner are inconsistent with the video presented. Respondent’s argument that he is free to yell whatever he wants on his property as there are no noise ordinances in place is contrary to the law. The State may in fact regulate speech even on private property when it constitutes harassment.
The language used by Respondent in this case was not merely inappropriate or argumentative. Rather, the language used amounts to fighting words. Fighting words are those that tend to incite a breach of the peace by their utterance … The homophobic slurs were uttered in addition to Respondent yelling, “Fuck you, Judy!” fifteen times or more. As such, Respondent’s verbalizations in this case do amount to harassment…The right to use one’s property as one sees fit extends only so far as it does not substantially interfere with the right of another to use and enjoy their property.
On Jan. 30, 2024, Wolf was charged with violating his HRO when he flipped off Judy Johnson’s security camera and said, “Fuck you, Judy” as he walked by her house. Wolf entered a plea of not guilty to the misdemeanor charge.
On June 27, 2024, Wolf’s arrest from 2023 finally went to trial. A jury found Wolf guilty of one count of violating an HRO and acquitted him of another. On July 31, 2024, Judge Nicole Hopps sentenced Wolf to 90 days in jail and a year of probation. She stayed the jail sentence, on the condition that Wolf remain law-abiding. Wolf returned home, a free man.
On Oct. 16, 2024, Wolf again violated his restraining orders (and his probation) by directing a barrage of shocking vulgarity at his neighbors, according to the police report:
Linda Rolfe called to report an order violation. She said Defendant was up until late on Oct. 16, 2024, and could be heard banging around and making offensive, obscene comments toward her sister Judy Johnson and her husband Jim Rolfe.
Linda showed footage from her security cameras that captured the noise Defendant was making. The deputy noted that at 8:52 PM, Defendant yelled, “I’m so proud of my *** being ****** ** the ***. I’m so proud of ***. I’m so proud of ** ***. I’m so proud to get ****** in the ***. Of course you are. I get ****** in the ***. I’m so proud, my *** *** ********** in the ***. *********** ***.” Six minutes later, Defendant went on another tirade on the same topic. At 9:04 PM, he yelled, “I’m so proud of ***. Best ****-****** *** ever. ****-******.” At 9:06 he yelled, “***** other **** ****. That’s what he does best ***** other **** *****. I’m so proud of him. So he taught him to get ****** ** *** ***. ****** ** *** *** again and again. You did that. Pieces of ****. ****** in the ***. Light a fire you ******* ****.” Throughout the recordings, loud bangs can be heard …
Defendant was arrested on Oct. 24, 2024. En route to the jail—and not in response to questioning—Defendant said, “I don’t like queers, and you know what? It’s okay to say I don’t like queers. Badge of queers? Fine. Fuck ‘em. I fucking hate ‘em. They are the degradation of society. I don’t care what you think one way or the other and it doesn’t matter because I still have that right to say so. Especially in my own home, on my own property, I can say what the fuck I want. If my neighbors don’t like it? Fuck them!” Defendant also accused the arresting officer of attempting to murder him when he was last arrested.
Wolf was charged with a felony for violating a restraining order because of a victim’s race, color, sex, or disability, and with four misdemeanors for violating restraining orders. He entered a plea of not guilty to all five counts.
During this time, because Adam Wolf hadn’t been able to make his mortgage payments, the bank foreclosed on his home; it was sold at a sheriff’s auction in Duluth on April 30, 2025.
Disaster
Shortly before nine o’clock in the morning on July 15, 2025, Judy Johnson saw Adam Wolf drive by on his tractor, towing a trailer of items underneath a tarp. As he headed toward East Pioneer Road and disappeared around the bend, she wondered what he was up to.
Twenty minutes later, when Judy came upstairs after doing some laundry and happened to glance out her kitchen window, she was shocked to see that Adam Wolf’s house was engulfed in flames.
“I heard a boom and the flames were coming out of the windows, the roof,” she told the Monitor. “It took maybe twenty minutes for the thing to just go.” While on the phone with 911, she saw Adam Wolf driving up her driveway on his lawnmower, now towing a barrel on wheels and holding what she believed to be a rifle. “He’s got a gun!” she told the 911 dispatcher.
The object in Wolf’s hand turned out to be a spraying wand attached to the barrel, which was filled with gasoline. Judy Johnson was terrified when Wolf noticed her in the window and beckoned for her to come out.
He approached her open garage door and sprayed gasoline inside, then ignited a flare and tossed it in. Miraculously, he threw the flare too hard, and it landed on a small carpet in the garage without igniting the gasoline. The carpet began to smolder, and Wolf drove back toward East Pioneer Road and out of sight around the bend.
What Judy Johnson did not know was that Wolf had already visited Linda and Jim Rolfe’s home and lit their deck on fire after spraying it with gas. When Jim Rolfe emerged from the house, Wolf sprayed him with gasoline as well. Rolfe retreated back inside his house and then ran out the back door. He grabbed a garden hose and began to spray the flames on his deck, which had begun to climb up the side of his house. After Wolf drove away, toward Judy’s home, the elderly Rolfe, blinking gasoline from his eyes, kicked the flare off the deck and was able to extinguish the fire before help arrived.
Normanna Township Fire Chief Corey Hulst responded within four minutes, in his personal car. Turning off East Pioneer Road, he encountered Wolf’s trailer parked at an angle across the road, which left only a narrow gap for traffic to pass. Driving around the trailer, Hulst noticed Wolf was working on something in the ditch, but continued on toward the location of the reported fire.
Hulst first drove to Jim and Linda Rolfe’s home. Finding the fire had already been extinguished, Hulst turned around and began driving back toward East Pioneer Road, intending to clear the trailer out of the way, to make room for the approaching fire engines. He found the trailer was now ablaze in the road. Adam Wolf was standing nearby, pointing something at him, which turned out to be a homemade gun.
Hulst threw his car into reverse and drove back around the bend, toward Judy’s house. At some point, Wolf fired, but he did not hit the fire chief. As Hulst paused in front of Judy’s house, awaiting reinforcements, he noticed smoke coming out of Johnson’s garage. Running inside, he discovered the flare on the smoldering carpet. He threw both the flare and the carpet out of the garage. None of the gas which Wolf had sprayed into the garage had ignited.
According to a Facebook statement issued by St. Louis County Sheriff Gordon Ramsay, a constable from neighboring Duluth Township arrived on the scene at 9:36 a.m. and was fired upon by Wolf. The constable was not hit and did not return fire. At 9:52, five St. Louis County deputies arrived and Wolf “engaged them”—which caused all five deputies to fire, killing Wolf.
Investigators would subsequently determine that Wolf had mounted nearly a dozen homemade guns on trees near the junction with East Pioneer Road, pointing toward the location where vehicles had to drive to get around the trailer. None of Wolf’s booby traps were triggered during the incident.
No one, besides Adam Wolf, was injured. The Rolfes’ home was saved, thanks to Jim Rolfe’s quick response, and Judy Johnson’s house only suffered a scorch mark on the garage floor, due to the fire chief’s quick thinking.
Adam Wolf’s house was completely consumed. His car, which had been parked in his driveway, facing away from the house, suffered fire damage on the back end.
The whereabouts of Wolf’s dog remains unknown.
Delay after delay
Throughout the years-long ordeal, the Johnsons and the Rolfes were dismayed by the seemingly endless delays of the judicial system—which often seemed to reward Adam Wolf for being difficult. One case was delayed twice because Wolf hadn’t properly completed his application for a public defender. In other instances, Wolf’s inability to cooperate with his appointed attorneys led to different attorneys being appointed—and this also led to additional delays.
At the time of his demise, Wolf was awaiting trial in two different cases, for one felony charge and five misdemeanor charges, related to his restraining order violations. It had been nine months since Wolf was arrested in one of the cases and 18 months since he had been arrested in the other. Both cases underwent multiple continuances and postponements. The trial for the case involving a felony had originally been set for July 8, 2025. After the prosecutor claimed that a key witness would be on vacation that day, the trial was once again postponed—until November.
The Johnsons and the Rolfes could not help but wonder: If Wolf had been convicted (and jailed) on July 8, would he have carried out his terrible attack?
The victims felt that their case had been downplayed by the courts, and treated as a run-of-the-mill neighborhood disagreement from the very beginning, instead of the truly horrifying situation they kept telling everyone that it was.
The Monitor greatly appreciates the willingness of Judy Johnson and her daughter, Julie Johnson, to speak with us about this terrifying event and the incidents which preceded it.
Judy Johnson was unstinting in her praise for the first responders. “I can’t say enough for the police, the firemen, the sheriff—I can’t say enough for those guys. They saved our lives. They absolutely did.”
Johnson was less enthusiastic about the justice system.
Judy Johnson: The court system, I know they’re overworked. They have so many cases to do, but it took way too long. When a harassment order is broken, you can wait six months to a year after that for them to get to it. And we had never dealt with the court system before in our life, so the first time, the person presiding said, ‘Look, the two of you have to learn to get along.’ What they didn’t understand was we had been threatened and harassed and scared and they left it, you know—that’s it … But it was not [just a neighborhood dispute]. It was far more serious than that.
So that’s what I want to say, if it helps somebody else. How else can you help somebody in this situation? You know, be sure you tell somebody right when it starts, and have proof. Have evidence to back up your story.
And then, I don’t know, how do we make our court system better? Hire more attorneys? Hire more police? You know, it seems like they’re all strung, they’re all busy and they can’t keep up with the workload. And I understand that. I understand there’s only so much you can do. There’s only so many hours in a day. But, boy, this one, I think, they really dropped the ball several times.
Epitaph
Before beginning his rampage, Adam Wolf left a cardboard box near his mailbox, containing his only belongings that weren’t lost in the fire. Inside the box were two Bibles and several dozen unopened packets of garden seeds. One Bible had a bookmark at the Song of Solomon. The other was marked at Psalm 69. We include it in full for you here.
Psalm 69
Save me, O God; for the waters are come in unto my soul.
I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing: I am come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me.
I am weary of my crying: my throat is dried: mine eyes fail while I wait for my God.
They that hate me without a cause are more than the hairs of mine head: they that would destroy me, being mine enemies wrongfully, are mighty: then I restored that which I took not away.
O God, thou knowest my foolishness; and my sins are not hid from thee.
Let not them that wait on thee, O Lord God of hosts, be ashamed for my sake: let not those that seek thee be confounded for my sake, O God of Israel.
Because for thy sake I have borne reproach; shame hath covered my face.
I am become a stranger unto my brethren, and an alien unto my mother’s children.
For the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up; and the reproaches of them that reproached thee are fallen upon me.
When I wept, and chastened my soul with fasting, that was to my reproach.
I made sackcloth also my garment; and I became a proverb to them.
They that sit in the gate speak against me; and I was the song of the drunkards.
But as for me, my prayer is unto thee, O Lord, in an acceptable time: O God, in the multitude of thy mercy hear me, in the truth of thy salvation.
Deliver me out of the mire, and let me not sink: let me be delivered from them that hate me, and out of the deep waters.
Let not the waterflood overflow me, neither let the deep swallow me up, and let not the pit shut her mouth upon me.
Hear me, O Lord; for thy loving kindness is good: turn unto me according to the multitude of thy tender mercies.
And hide not thy face from thy servant; for I am in trouble: hear me speedily.
Draw nigh unto my soul, and redeem it: deliver me because of mine enemies.
Thou hast known my reproach, and my shame, and my dishonour: mine adversaries are all before thee.
Reproach hath broken my heart; and I am full of heaviness: and I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none.
They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.
Let their table become a snare before them: and that which should have been for their welfare, let it become a trap.
Let their eyes be darkened, that they see not; and make their loins continually to shake.
Pour out thine indignation upon them, and let thy wrathful anger take hold of them.
Let their habitation be desolate; and let none dwell in their tents.
For they persecute him whom thou hast smitten; and they talk to the grief of those whom thou hast wounded.
Add iniquity unto their iniquity: and let them not come into thy righteousness.
Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with the righteous.
But I am poor and sorrowful: let thy salvation, O God, set me up on high.
I will praise the name of God with a song, and will magnify him with thanksgiving.
This also shall please the Lord better than an ox or bullock that hath horns and hoofs.
The humble shall see this, and be glad: and your heart shall live that seek God.
For the Lord heareth the poor, and despiseth not his prisoners.
Let the heaven and earth praise him, the seas, and every thing that moveth therein.
For God will save Zion, and will build the cities of Judah: that they may dwell there, and have it in possession.
The seed also of his servants shall inherit it: and they that love his name shall dwell therein.
Correction, July 20, 2025. John Schulte was a judicial referee in the Wolf case, not a judge as originally stated.
Psalm 69.
Heh. 69.