Jeffrey Thomas was out on E. Franklin Avenue on Sunday night getting ready to catch a bus to work when he heard the shots erupt up the block.
Police search for suspects in second recent mass shooting in Minneapolis
Eight people, including six teenagers, were injured in the shooting.
August 21, 2023 at 9:38PM
Thomas saw a group of people frantically running toward him. He said he ran in the direction of the gunfire, worried a friend or family member may have been caught in the chaos, and he found three men on the sidewalk in front of a market bleeding from their legs.
"It was bad," he said. "It was really bad."
On Monday, Minneapolis police said they were still searching for suspects responsible for the barrage of gunfire just before 6 p.m. Sunday that wounded eight people — six of them teenagers — near the corner of E. Franklin and S. Chicago avenues.
The violent episode marks the second mass shooting in a week and a half in Minneapolis, after two gunmen shot up a DIY punk venue called Nudieland on Aug. 11.
Transit police nearby reported hearing "the sound of automatic gunfire," Minneapolis police said in a statement Monday. At least 41 shell casings from three various calibers were recovered near S. Elliot and Franklin avenues, according to police, among them a .223 —commonly used in high-powered guns such as the AR-15.
The wounded included a 45-year-old woman and seven males: one 15, three 16, one 17, one 18 and one 48.
Some of the gunfire hit a house at the corner of Elliot and Franklin, but no one inside was hurt, said Police Chief Brian O'Hara on the scene Sunday night.
O'Hara said two male suspects ran north on Elliot Avenue after the shooting. Police did not have any indication that the shooting was random, and he described the block as a hot spot.
"As in all investigations," read a statement from police Monday, "all possible motives will be considered by investigators."
'So many rounds'
Kayseh Magan, who is running for the City Council's Sixth Ward seat, said he and his uncle heard the gunfire as they drove through the intersection, sending them ducking in their car and speeding away as the shots continued to ring out.
"It was so many rounds in quick succession," Magan said. "You could look at the rearview and see all these people running toward you away from the gunfire."
After the shooting stopped, several people nearby ran to help the wounded. Shane Gross said they loaded three injured men into his car and his sister drove them to the hospital. Gross, who said he was born down the street from where the shooting took place and now lives in Duluth, said many in this area don't trust police. He said the city isn't investing in community resources for young people, and that's exacerbating violence like this in the neighborhood.
Ventura Village, the part of the Phillips neighborhood where the shooting took place, is among Minneapolis communities that experienced significant increases in reported gunfire since 2020 compared with pre-pandemic years, with a Star Tribune analysis showing the bulk of those occurring in the half-mile radius of Chicago and Franklin. And as reported gunfire decreased by about 30% citywide this year, change in Ventura Village has been slower as gunshot volume has stayed roughly the same as in 2022.
That half-mile radius of Chicago and Franklin has also seen at least 17 murders since 2019, including the shooting death of of 26-year-old Ali A. Reed in June.
Cary Stegal, who lives a block away, said he wasn't home during the shooting, but he returned around 7 p.m. to find police squads swarming. When he first moved here 20 years ago, Stegal said, the neighborhood seemed to be getting better every day. But he saw it begin to "deteriorate" shortly before the pandemic and then the murder of George Floyd and the unrest that followed. "All the disruption has just made it worse," he said.
Most of what he sees is low-level crime, like drug dealing. "But you just never know when something worse is going to erupt out of that."
Anyone with information is encouraged to call CrimeStoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477). Tips may be submitted electronically at CrimeStoppersMN.org. All Tips are anonymous, and anyone providing information leading to an arrest and conviction may be eligible for a financial reward.
Police are also continuing their search for two gunmen who shot up a crowd of people at the Nudieland punk music house party in south Minneapolis, killing one and injuring six others about three-fourths of a mile from Sunday's mass shooting.
The gunfire in the backyard of the house on the 2200 block of S. 16th Ave. claimed the life of 35-year-old August Golden, a talented songwriter and musician who played in the punk band Scrounger.
Star Tribune staff writers Jeff Hargarten and Josie Albertson-Grove contributed to this report.
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