Star Tribune
Police arrest five people in fatal Mall of America shooting
Police arrested five people Saturday in connection with a fatal shooting the night before at the Mall of America, and Bloomington Police Chief Booker Hodges said all would face murder charges.
The victim, a 19-year-old man, was shot Friday night inside the Nordstrom department store at the Bloomington shopping destination, prompting an hourlong lockdown on one of the last nights of shopping ahead of Christmas. Police said the shooting was preceded by a disagreement between two groups of young men and juveniles.
Two 18-year-old men and three 17-year-old male juveniles were arrested, Hodges said. He said one of the 18-year-olds is believed to have been the shooter, but that one other person in the group may have also fired. Hodges said police are still looking for a sixth suspect.
The five were taken into custody Saturday morning at a residence in St. Louis Park by SWAT team officers from St. Louis Park, Edina and Minnetonka, Hodges said.
“In Bloomington, if you come here and murder people at our mall, you get one of these at Christmas,” Hodges said at an early evening press conference as he held up an orange prison jumpsuit. He said the suspects are refusing to describe what happened, but investigators believe it involved what Hodges called a longstanding feud between two groups.
Those arrested are likely to be charged on Tuesday, Hodges said. The victim’s name has not been released. Hodges said he and detectives have been in contact with the victim’s family members since last night.
Hodges said police have evidence that the five people they arrested stopped at a White Castle to pick up food after they fled the mall Friday night. “It appears they felt it necessary to get something to eat,” he said.
Mall of America officials said there was increased security and police presence at the mall Saturday, but did not detail whether security would increase or change going forward.
The mall was bustling Saturday evening. Sharita Robinson, who works at a store just outside Nordstrom, which was closed Saturday and had its metal grate pulled down, said the mall had been busy all day and that she saw lots of families with their children. Robinson, who’d been in the lockdown Friday night, said she would not have brought her own kids Saturday.
Gov. Tim Walz condemned the shooting Saturday.
“The violence at MOA last night is absolutely unacceptable,” Walz tweeted. “We are in touch with local officials to provide the support and resources they need.”
Hodges said Public Safety Commissioner John Harrington followed up with him and pledged help if requested. Hodges said the FBI, ATF and Hennepin County have been helping with the investigation.
The shooting sent nearby shoppers scrambling. Hodges said the first officer on the scene was on duty at a store near Nordstrom when he saw panicked shoppers running out of the department store’s entrance into the mall.
Some frightened shoppers shared video and details on social media Friday night. Several New York Giants players, including one of the team’s sportscasters, were visiting the mall ahead of their Christmas Eve game against the Vikings during the shooting. The team said in a statement that players were escorted out of the building by mall security and Bloomington police.
Friday’s shooting marks the third time within a year that gunfire erupted in Minnesota’s premier mall, one of the largest in the country. One man was shot in the leg and another was grazed by a bullet on the mall’s third floor last New Year’s Eve. An 18-year-old later confessed to the shooting, telling police that he was trying to escape pursuers who were upset with him about an earlier incident before firing when one of them nearly chased him down.
Months later another shooting sent the mall into lockdown for two hours when a dispute between two groups of people ended with several gunshots outside a Nike store. No injuries were reported. Weeks after that, a man armed with a long gun robbed a Lids store in the mall before being tackled and arrested by authorities.
Mall security had installed metal detectors at its north entrance on a trial basis, but it was unclear if those detectors were still in place Friday. Mall policy bans guns and fireworks from the premises, but gun-rights advocates have argued that permit-to-carry holders can bring firearms into the building’s common areas.
Around 40 million visitors explore the mall each year, according to its fact sheet, and about 40% are tourists. The mall contains more than 520 stores and rakes in nearly $2 billion in economic activity for Minnesota.
Hodges said authorities believe this is the second time since the mall opened in 1992 that someone was the victim of fatal violence there. The first was a domestic incident in 1999, he said.
DULUTH – The Minnesota and Wisconsin transportation departments will make upgrades to the Richard I. Bong Memorial Bridge in the summer of 2025, in preparation for the structure to become the premiere route between this city and Superior during reconstruction of the Blatnik Bridge.
Built in 1961, the Blatnik Bridge carries 33,000 vehicles per day along Interstate 535 and Hwy. 53. It will be entirely rebuilt, starting in 2027, with the help of $1 billion in federal funding announced earlier this year. MnDOT and WisDOT are splitting the remaining costs of the project, about $4 million each.
According to MnDOT, projects on the Bong Bridge will include spot painting, concrete surface repairs to the bridge abutments, concrete sealer on the deck, replacing rubber strip seal membranes on the main span’s joints and replacing light poles on the bridge and its points of entry. It’s expected to take two months, transportation officials said during a recent meeting at the Superior Public Library.
During this time there will be occasional lane closures, detours at the off-ramps, and for about three weeks the sidewalk path alongside the bridge will be closed.
The Bong Bridge, which crosses the St. Louis River, opened to traffic in 1985 and is the lesser-used of the two bridges. Officials said they want to keep maintenance to a minimum on the span during the Blatnik project, which is expected to take four years.
Red Wing will celebrate the grand opening of its first permanent set of pickleball courts next week with an “inaugural play” on the six courts at Colvill Park on the banks of the Mississippi, between a couple of marinas and next to the aquatic center.
Among the first to get to play on the new courts will be David Anderson, who brought pickleball to the local YMCA in 2008, before the nationwide pickleball craze took hold, and Denny Yecke, at 92 the oldest pickleball player in Red Wing.
The inaugural play begins at 11 a.m. Tuesday, with a rain date of the next day. Afterward will be food and celebration at the Colvill Park Courtyard building.
Tim Sletten, the city’s former police chief, discovered America’s fastest-growing sport a decade ago after he retired. With fellow members of the Red Wing Pickleball Group, he’d play indoors at the local YMCA or outdoors at a local school, on courts made for other sports. But they didn’t have a permanent place, so they approached the city about building one.
When a city feasibility study came up with a high cost, about $350,000, Sletten’s group got together to raise money.
The courts are even opening ahead of schedule, originally set for 2025.
REDWOOD FALLS, MINN. – A truck crashing into a school bus left nine with minor injuries Wednesday morning in rural Redwood County, a statement from the Redwood County Sheriff’s office said.
The bus driver, serving the Wabasso Public School District, failed to yield when entering the intersection of County Road 7 and 280th Street, the statement said.
Deputies received word of the crash around 8:15 a.m. and identified the bus driver as Edward Aslesen, 72, of Milroy.
The nine injured passengers on the bus were transported to local hospitals, the statement said.
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings