By Zoë Jack­son

Minneapolis Star Tribune

Min­ne­ap­olis cou­ple Lex and Celina Berndt did not ex­pect to mar­ry af­ter just a four-month en­gage­ment.

Celina, 24, popped the ques­tion on Val­en­tine’s Day, with an i­dyl­lic back­drop of a beach in Puer­to Rico.

“We went to a roof­top res­tau­rant on the beach, and Celina took me up to the se­cond floor over­look­ing the o­cean and pro­posed. It was re­al­ly cute. They al­read­y knew I was going to say yes,” Lex said.

The cou­ple had envisioned a two-year en­gage­ment, af­ter Lex, 25, wrapped up stud­ies. But when George Floyd was killed by Min­ne­ap­olis po­lice on Memorial Day, their plans shift­ed dras­ti­cal­ly. Af­ter weeks of pro­tests and ac­tiv­ism, the cou­ple mar­ried in front of the burned-out Third Pre­cinct police station, on the 51st anni­ver­sa­ry of the Stone­wall riots in New York City.

The Third Precinct station was the focus of protests because it was where the officers who killed Floyd worked. The precinct has had a reputation for being home to renegade cops.

READ MORE