The investigation began with seizures and low oxygen levels before examinations revealed 60 fractures across two infant brothers.
MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. — The criminal case that sent a young Minnesota father to prison for nearly 16 years began in a hospital, where a 3-month-old boy arrived with seizures, dangerously low oxygen levels and injuries that doctors said could not have resulted from an accident.
Testing at Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis revealed bleeding around the infant’s brain, hemorrhaging near his spine, bruises and fractures in several parts of his body. Some rib fractures were healing while others were newer. Doctors ultimately counted 46 broken bones. Their findings led authorities to examine the boy’s twin brother, who was found to have 14 fractures and injuries to his eyes, mouth and other parts of his body. Those medical evaluations gave investigators the central evidence in a case that ended in June 2026 with a 189-month sentence for the twins’ father, Dylan Raymond Strain.
Child Protective Services had alerted St. Paul police to suspected abuse in January 2025. One of the twins was seen at the hospital on Jan. 31 after the seizures and low oxygen episode, according to the criminal complaint. The examination documented blood collecting between the skull and brain on both sides, spinal hemorrhaging and numerous injuries to the ribs, arms and legs. Medical workers said the injuries created a significant risk of death. They also warned that the child faced a high risk of developmental delays and that the brain trauma could cause permanent disability, including vision loss.
The fractures in different stages of healing were especially important to the investigation because they showed that the infant had been injured on more than one occasion. The child was only 3 months old and had been born prematurely, limiting the kinds of movement that could plausibly produce such injuries without outside force. Doctors stated in the complaint that there was no accidental explanation for what they found. Public accounts of the case have not identified the precise dates on which each fracture occurred, but the medical evidence indicated a repeated pattern rather than a single isolated incident.
After the first child’s condition was documented, doctors evaluated his twin. The second boy had bruises on his forearms and abdomen, rib fractures, a broken collarbone and a metaphyseal fracture near a growth plate. He also had a healing cut beneath his tongue and hemorrhaging in his eyes. Medical workers said those eye injuries were consistent with abuse and created a serious danger of impaired sight. They counted 14 fractures in all and said that child, like his brother, was at risk of developmental delays.
The examinations changed the scope of the case. What began with concern about one critically injured infant became an investigation involving two children, separate sets of injuries and conduct that investigators believed had occurred over time. The total of 60 fractures became a shorthand used in news reports, but the complaint described a wider range of harm, including brain bleeding, spinal hemorrhaging, bruising, oral injuries and possible damage to the children’s vision. Authorities did not publicly release the twins’ names, and subsequent reports have not provided a detailed update on their present health.
Investigators then turned to the adults who had cared for the twins. The boys lived in a St. Paul home with their parents, grandmother and other children. Their grandmother told police that she had heard Strain screaming at the babies and had heard episodes of what she described as hysterical crying. After one such episode, she saw an injury to an infant’s lip. Days later, she noticed a similar injury. She told officers that Strain had said he forced a bottle into a baby’s mouth too hard.
The grandmother also described signs of anger in the twins’ room. She recalled seeing a hole punched in a wall and, around the time the children were taken for medical care, finding bloody baby wipes on the floor. She said Strain held a wipe to one child’s mouth and described himself as a bad father who could not handle the situation. Her observations did not account for each medical injury, but they helped investigators establish what had been happening in the home before the hospital examinations exposed the full scale of the abuse.
The twins’ mother told police that injuries appeared when Strain had been responsible for watching the babies. She described him holding them on his lap, shouting and bouncing them rapidly enough that their arms and legs moved uncontrollably. She said she would take the children from him when she saw that conduct. At one stage, according to KSTP’s account of the complaint, she tried to accept responsibility for some injuries. Medical professionals, however, said the actions she described were unlikely to have caused the trauma they documented.
Text messages between the parents gave investigators additional evidence about Strain’s difficulty managing anger while caring for the infants. During a police interview, Strain said that the children’s crying made him highly agitated. He admitted squeezing them too tightly and striking a wall. He also said he was the likely cause of the injuries and stated that the interview amounted to a confession, according to the complaint. He told investigators that the twins’ mother had not been the person hurting them.
Ramsey County prosecutors charged Strain, then 19, with two counts of first-degree assault causing great bodily harm and two counts of malicious punishment of a child. The charges were allegations when filed in February 2025. The case no longer required a trial after Strain pleaded guilty in May 2026 to the two first-degree assault counts. News reports did not provide the complete plea agreement or explain the final handling of the malicious-punishment charges.
Under Minnesota law, first-degree assault involving great bodily harm carries a maximum possible term of 20 years in prison. The twins’ injuries met the prosecution’s claim of great bodily harm because doctors described a risk of death and the possibility of lasting impairment. Strain’s guilty pleas established his criminal responsibility for the two assault counts, replacing the earlier allegations with convictions. The available reporting did not include a statement from his defense lawyer about the plea or a transcript showing whether Strain addressed the court.
At sentencing June 22, the court imposed 86 months for one child’s assault and 103 months for the other, according to KARE 11. The judge ordered the sentences to be served consecutively rather than concurrently. That decision produced a total of 189 months, or 15 years and nine months. Consecutive terms are served one after the other, while concurrent sentences overlap. The structure therefore made the punishment significantly longer and treated the assaults against the twins as separate harms involving separate victims.
KSTP reported immediately after the hearing that Strain remained in the Ramsey County Jail and was expected to be transferred to the Minnesota Correctional Facility in St. Cloud. The Minnesota Department of Corrections publishes custody information for people committed to the state system, though the amount of time actually spent in prison can depend on applicable state release and supervision rules. No publicly reviewed sentencing transcript was available to explain every factor the court considered in selecting the two terms.
The medical evidence that first drew authorities into the case remains its most consequential record. It documented injuries that were both extensive and potentially permanent before either infant could describe what had happened. The criminal proceeding has ended with Strain’s guilty pleas and consecutive prison sentences, but the twins’ long-term prognosis has not been publicly clarified. Doctors warned of possible developmental and vision problems, and no later medical report has established the extent of their recovery.
Author note: Last updated July 20, 2026.