5 things we learned so far about the Minneapolis Catholic school shooter
Investigators are working to understand what may have driven a shooter to open fire this morning on a church, killing two children and wounding more than a dozen parishioners, who were marking the first week of class at Annunciation Catholic School.
Minneapolis police chief Brian O’Hara identified the suspected shooter as Robin Westman, who died from a self-inflicted wound. Westman, 23, graduated from Annunciation’s grade school in 2017, according to a yearbook photo.
Here’s what we’ve learned:
Shooter’s “manifesto”: The shooter had posted a “manifesto” that was timed to be published on YouTube, O’Hara said at a news conference Wednesday. In the videos, two which were titled with Westman’s full name, the person recording the video pages through a handwritten notebook and displays a shooting target with an image of Jesus and a collection of guns, magazines and ammunition laid out on a bed.
Mass shooting obsession: Gun magazines shown in the videos lists the names of six notorious mass shooters, including Adam Lanza, whom the suspect wrote they had a “deep fascination” with. Lanza gunned down 26 people – including 20 children – at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut in 2012.
Hand-drawn diagram: The notebook featured in the videos included a diagram of the inside of a church that seems to match the layout of Annunciation Church.
Name change: In 2019, the suspect’s mother filed to legally change the suspect’s name from Robert Paul Westman to Robin M. Westman, court documents show. A judge who approved the petition in January 2020 wrote that the suspect “identifies as a female and wants her name to reflect that identification.”
No prior record: A search of state court records showed no criminal history for Westman, but some traffic citations in 2021.