A father arriving with his children helped four youngsters escape as police say violence unfolded inside a Hopkins home daycare.

HOPKINS, Minn. — A father arriving for what should have been an ordinary morning daycare drop-off instead heard children screaming from inside a Hopkins home, entered through the familiar rear doorway and encountered an attack that police say left a woman and her 7-year-old daughter dead. His arrival also became the moment that brought an unfolding family tragedy to the attention of authorities.

The Aug. 12 killings at Brown Bear Childcare were later connected to another death in Burnsville. Police identified the Hopkins victims as Kristen Ann Brown, 41, who operated the licensed daycare, and her daughter, Evie Ann Brown, 7. Authorities say Kristen’s husband and Evie’s father, Nathan Matthew Brown, 41, killed them before dying by suicide inside the residence. Investigators also linked Nathan Brown to the earlier killing of his mother, 78-year-old Alice Anne Brown, at the Burnsville home where he had recently been staying. Six children other than Evie were at the daycare when the Hopkins violence occurred, and none was reported physically injured.

The clearest public account of how the emergency began appears in a Hennepin County search warrant filed as investigators collected evidence after the deaths. According to the warrant, a father arrived at about 9:05 a.m. to leave two children at Brown Bear. He followed the normal drop-off route to the back of the house, where the daycare operated from the lower level. Before he had settled his children inside for the day, he heard screaming. Investigators said the man entered and saw Nathan Brown attacking Kristen Brown and then Evie.

The parent quickly shifted from a routine caregiver handoff to an attempt to move children out of the house. The warrant says he gathered his own two children and two other daycare children, got them outside and called 911. Police Chief Brent Johnson later said a total of six children besides Evie were in the daycare that morning. Officers arriving at the property removed the children who remained inside and reunited all of the surviving youngsters with their families. Authorities have not reported that any of those children suffered physical injuries.

Hopkins police were dispatched to the Tyler Avenue North residence shortly after 9 a.m. Officers found Kristen and Evie dead inside the home. Investigators also found Nathan Brown dead elsewhere in the residence from what police described as a self-inflicted gunshot wound. A search warrant later said officers recovered a screwdriver associated with the killings. Authorities have released few additional details about the physical evidence, and public statements from investigators have focused largely on the sequence of events rather than graphic descriptions of the scene.

Within hours, police were dealing with another death involving the same family. Burnsville officers were called at 12:23 p.m. to a residence near Maple Island Road and Joplin Avenue after a report of a stabbing. They found Alice Brown dead inside. Burnsville police initially described her as a close relative of the man involved in the Hopkins case and said that Nathan had recently been living at the residence. Later identification by authorities and relatives established that Alice was Nathan’s mother. Investigators concluded that she was killed before the attack at the Hopkins daycare.

The connection between the two cities changed what initially looked like separate emergency calls into a single investigation of violence within one family. Police have not released a minute-by-minute account of Nathan Brown’s movements between Burnsville and Hopkins, and they have not announced exactly when Alice was killed. Authorities have said, however, that they believe Nathan killed his mother first and later went to the Hopkins residence where Kristen operated Brown Bear Childcare. Police said there was no indication after Nathan’s death that another suspect remained at large or that there was an ongoing threat to the public.

Investigators also learned that changes were already underway in the Brown household. According to the search warrant, at least one daycare parent told police that Kristen had recently informed families that Brown Bear would close because of relationship issues with Nathan. Friends and relatives later said the couple had separated and that Nathan had been staying with Alice in Burnsville. Those facts have become part of the public record surrounding the case, but authorities have not identified the separation, daycare closure or any specific dispute as the motive for the killings. A definitive motive has not been publicly established.

Brown Bear Childcare had been part of the Hopkins neighborhood for several years before the attack. State records cited in reporting after the deaths showed that Kristen had been licensed to provide family child care since 2019. The program was licensed for as many as 10 children and had been operating from the family residence. Public descriptions of Brown Bear emphasized activities including music, cooking, outings and age-appropriate learning. Kristen opened the program after Evie was born, allowing her to continue working with children while raising her daughter at home.

That history made the killings particularly personal for families whose children had spent their early years at Brown Bear. In a statement released after the deaths, daycare families described the residence as far more than a place where parents left children during working hours. They said Kristen had an unusual ability to care for and teach young children and that families had selected Brown Bear specifically because of their trust in her. They also described Evie as an important part of the daycare community, a child who had grown up around the younger children who came through the program.

The families’ concerns after the attack extended beyond grief. Their children had suddenly lost both a familiar caregiver and the setting around which much of their weekly routine had been organized. Several had also been present when the violence occurred. Families asked for privacy as they focused on the emotional health of the surviving children. Authorities have not released the children’s names, and officials have generally avoided giving identifying details about them because of their ages and their status as witnesses to a traumatic event.

Kristen’s sister, Amanda Paulson, later publicly thanked the father who arrived during the attack and helped move children from the home. Paulson described his intervention as heroic, noting that he entered an unexpected emergency while bringing his own children to daycare. She also spoke publicly about Kristen and Evie as members of a family whose lives should not be reduced to the circumstances of their deaths. Paulson remembered Kristen as kind and peaceable and described Evie as an energetic child with a distinct personality. She also called attention to Alice’s death in Burnsville so that the older woman would not be overlooked as attention focused on the daycare.

The effect of the killings reached first responders and local officials as well. Johnson said shortly after the deaths that officers were visibly affected by what they encountered inside the Hopkins residence. The presence of young children made the situation especially difficult, he said. Hopkins Mayor Patrick Hanlon later described the deaths as an immense loss for relatives, neighbors, daycare families and city employees who responded. A community vigil held in the days after the killings drew friends, former daycare families and other residents who gathered to remember Kristen, Evie and Alice.

At the vigil and in later statements, people who knew Kristen emphasized her work with children rather than the violence that ended the daycare. Former Brown Bear families recalled the routines she built, the activities she organized and the close relationships that formed over years of daily care. Evie was remembered as a child who had grown alongside the daycare and helped make younger children feel at home. Alice was remembered by relatives for her creativity and kindness. Those accounts offered a view of the three victims that was separate from the police reports and search warrants that documented their deaths.

The case will not follow the normal path of a multiple-homicide prosecution because Nathan Brown also died at the Hopkins home. There will be no arrest or criminal trial in which prosecutors present evidence about his actions or attempt to establish a motive to a jury. Instead, the public record is being assembled through police findings, search warrants, medical examiner determinations and witness accounts. Investigators have continued working to document the timeline and evidence from both residences, but they have not publicly announced a definitive explanation for why the violence occurred.

What authorities have established is the broad sequence across the two communities: Alice Brown was killed in Burnsville, Kristen and Evie Brown were killed at Brown Bear Childcare in Hopkins, six other children survived the attack, and Nathan Brown died at the Hopkins residence. The discovery of that sequence began when one parent arrived for a normal morning drop-off, heard that something was wrong and helped four children leave a home that had, until that morning, been known to their families as a place of routine care.

Author note: Last updated September 22, 2026.