A violent weekend in the Twin Cities saw two teenagers gunned down in drive-by shootings and a woman shot to death through the door and window of her home in the presence of children.
On Sunday afternoon, community leaders and police asked for the public's help in solving Saturday's shooting death of a 14-year-old boy in Minneapolis, which police said could be linked to the fatal shooting of 18-year-old Gustavo Ortega in Richfield later the same day.
"To allow those responsible for this child's death to continue walking the streets is unthinkable," said Lt. Amelia Huffman, the head of the Minneapolis Police Department's homicide unit.
The drive-by shootings, both of which killed Hispanic teenagers, occurred within four hours and 7 miles of each other. Authorities are investigating a possible connection between the cases, but offered no more details. No one has been arrested.
At about 1 a.m. Sunday, less than 12 hours after Saturday's second shooting, a woman was fatally shot in Minneapolis' Phillips neighborhood. Another woman in the house was grazed in the cheek by a bullet. That case, the city's fifth homicide of the year compared with nine by this time last year, does not appear to be related to Saturday's shootings, police said. A 28-year-old man was arrested in the woman's death.
At the Sunday news conference in south Minneapolis, Hispanic community leaders called on their own to put aside fears regarding immigration scrutiny and come forward with information that could solve the 14-year-old boy's death. His identity has not been released.
The motives in the drive-by cases are uncertain, but authorities are looking into possible gang ties, including to the Vatos Locos gang.
Alberto Monserrate, president and CEO of Latino Communications Network LLC, said he knows that people with gang and criminal ties are listening to his company's radio station and that they should "calm that anger."