Girlfriend pleads guilty to buying guns man used to kill 3 Burnsville first responders

Ashley Dyrdahl’s voice was shaky as she wiped away tears and admitted Tuesday to buying the guns her boyfriend used to ambush and kill three first responders in Burnsville last year.

Dyrdahl, 36, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in St. Paul to two charges of straw purchasing, which means she knowingly bought firearms for a person prohibited from owning them. In return, state officials will dismiss nine additional charges brought by a federal grand jury last March.

Dyrdahl’s boyfriend, 38-year-old Shannon Cortez Gooden fired more than 100 rounds from the illegally purchased weapons in February when officers responded to his and Dyrdahl’s home on a domestic abuse call. Officers Paul Elmstrand and Matthew Ruge, both 27, and 40-year-old firefighter/paramedic Adam Finseth were killed. Gooden also injured police Sgt. Adam Medlicott before taking his own life.

In exchange for her plea, prosecutors recommended a sentence of at least 37 months. Judges on the federal level have wide discretion and can depart from what guidelines suggest. District Judge Jerry Blackwell will determine the length after a pre-sentence investigation.

“Your actions here go beyond the purchase of firearms,” Blackwell told Dyrdahl. “Your actions in this case contributed further to the cycle [of gun violence].”

Dyrdahl declined to comment while leaving the courtroom, but her defense attorney read a statement expressing her “deep, deep remorse.” They hope her plea brings some relief to the community.

Medlicott, Elmstrand’s wife, Ruge’s mother and sister, and Finseth’s wife attended Tuesday’s hearing, but deferred comments to Burnsville Fire Department Chief BJ Jungmann.

Jungmann said they are pleased that Dyrdahl will take accountability for the shooting, but added that it’s little reprieve.

“The hard part is we can’t get back what we really want. We can’t get back our three colleagues that are important to us and the families,” Jungmann said. “It shook the bedrock of the community.”

According to the indictment:

In 2016, Dyrdahl began a relationship with Gooden, and knew that he had previously been convicted of second-degree assault, a felony, which precluded him from owning firearms. In 2019, she filed a letter in support of Gooden’s petition to restore his firearm rights in which she acknowledged his conviction and crime. That petition was later denied. Despite this, the charges said, Dyrdahl bought five firearms from two federally licensed dealers between September 2023 and last January before “knowingly and intentionally” transferring them to Gooden.

Among the guns Dyrdahl bought and transferred to Gooden at his direction were three semiautomatic AR-15-style firearm lower-receivers. One was a Franklin Armory FAI-15 .300-caliber semiautomatic firearm equipped with a binary trigger. A firearm with a binary trigger fires one shot when the trigger is pulled and another when the trigger is released, effectively doubling the rate of fire. Dyrdahl also purchased a .300-caliber barrel for the lower receiver.

Dyrdahl knew Gooden was loading the semiautomatic AR-15-style firearms with .300 Blackout ammunition, which is a heavier load ammunition that has an increased potential for being lethal, prosecutors said.

A law enforcement search of the bedroom Gooden and Dyrdahl shared found a “stockpile of fully loaded magazines as well as boxes with hundreds of additional rounds of ammunition and additional firearms,” the indictment read.

A conviction in 2008 for second-degree assault in Dakota County prohibited Gooden from possessing firearms or ammunition. In August 2020, he petitioned the court unsuccessfully to regain his right to own a gun. He said that he wanted to protect himself and his family, according to court records.

Staff writers Stephen Montemayor and Paul Walsh contributed to this report.