A young man carrying white flowers approached a police line a block away from the church and school on Wednesday where hours earlier an assailant opened fire on schoolchildren, blasting bullets through stained glass windows and killing two kids.
Arthur Louie grew up a few blocks away from Annunciation church in south Minneapolis, Minnesota. The church throws a fair before school starts, he said, describing it as a “staple point in this community”. He was devastated to hear about the shooting, holding back tears as he said he wanted to bring flowers to pay his respects. He did not attend the school, but has many friends connected to it and described the neighborhood as tight-knit.
“It’s everything. We’re so tied together. Block parties are huge. The community here just gets along so well,” he said. “Something like this happens, it doesn’t matter what our beliefs are, we’re going to band together.”
Louie kneeled at a stoplight pole outside the police line, pulling the flowers from their plastic and placing them on the ground, starting a makeshift vigil.
A man lays flowers outside of a police perimeter at Annunciation school. Photograph: Stephen Maturen/Getty Images
The assailant, identified by police as Robin Westman, killed themself as well. Police said Wednesday they are investigating any potential motives and executing search warrants related to the shooter. FBI director Kash Patel said the bureau is “investigating this shooting as an act of domestic terrorism and hate crime targeting Catholics”. In addition to the two children killed, 14 children and three adults were injured.
Yellow police tape lined the block, preventing people from walking up to the church. News cameras gathered, swarming to get video footage of elected officials and police vehicles moving around the site.
A Red Cross van, with a red tent beside it, handed out snacks and water. White tents sat outside the church. Men wearing shirts that said “Chaplain” in yellow letters were on site, one wearing an “I ♥ Jesus” hat.
Neighbors walking by the police line to get groceries at a nearby Kowalski’s Markets or walking their dogs stopped to look at the scene, some making calls to loved ones or snapping photos. The school is near a main road and commercial area. After one woman walked beside the police line, she said: “It just makes you sick.”
A parent hugs her son as officials respond to the shooting incident. Photograph: Richard Tsong-Taatarii/AP
Armored vehicles and tactical vans and police SUVs with their lights flashing lined the streets outside the church. Minneapolis police chief Brian O’Hara said at an afternoon press conference that dozens of police officers responded to the scene and now are grappling with what they witnessed.
“Many of them are deeply traumatized by what they saw as are, obviously, all of the children, all of the staff members … everyone who is at mass this morning,” O’Hara said.
The school shooting is the fourth shooting within 24 hours in the city. It comes less than three months after the targeted killings of state lawmaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark.
The shooting, at a church beside a Catholic school, has shaken this community. Two places of sanctuary – a learning environment, a spiritual home – were attacked, puncturing a sense of safety. Neighbors who heard gunshots ran out of their homes to help. Parents ran to the school to find their kids on Wednesday morning. One neighborhood group set up a relief station outside this afternoon for people to stop by, chat and commune with each other amid the tragedy.
Members of the church comfort one another after the shooting. Photograph: Renee Jones Schneider/TNS/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock
Bishop Harding Smith, a pastor and anti-violence advocate, was at the scene, standing outside the police line. “Because of what has happened today, our young boys and girls are going to be afraid to even come to school. They’re going to be afraid to leave the home. All they keep hearing echoing is the sound of the bullets and emergency vehicles, it causes trauma.”
Rev. Angela Denker, a pastor and writer in Minneapolis, was speaking about radicalization and violence at an event in a nearby suburb when the shooting happened, she told the Guardian via phone later on Wednesday. She recognized people in the videos and photos from the scene as friends of hers. Church communities in the area are meeting tonight to hold vigil, and church leaders are discussing how to keep their parishioners safe while remaining welcoming.
Rushing to point fingers or heat up rhetoric in the immediate aftermath of a tragedy like this isn’t helpful, though everyone needs to consider their role in contributing to a culture where young people are increasingly violent, she said. “The one thing that I feel confident saying at this point is that we live in a world that has become very, very cruel to children,” she said.
School just started up again for the year – schools across the metro area are opening classes, others holding open houses for students to meet the teachers. “It just takes so many of the cherished experiences of childhood and of parenting, like back to school, and it just turns all of it into something that feels really scary,” Denker said.
A student who was inside the church during the shooting told local TV news channel Fox 9 that a friend was laying on top of him to protect him, and his friend was hit. Weston Halsne told the outlet that the shooting was “super scary” and that the students had not practiced active shooter drills in the church, just in the school.
The school’s principal, Matt DeBoer, addressed his school community in a press conference on Wednesday afternoon, telling them: “I love you, you’re so brave, and I’m so sorry this happened to us today.”
Teachers and students were heroes to one another, he said. The school lost “two angels”. He implored people to commit to making sure no other community, school, person has to experience what his school experienced today.
“I beg you,” he said. “I ask you to please pray, but don’t stop with your words. Let’s make a difference and support this community’s children, these families, these teachers. Never again can we let this happen.”
