Three teens shot near fairgrounds in apparently random attack

Three teenage boys were shot and injured in a parking lot south of the Minnesota State Fair just before the fair closed Monday night. The wounded are expected to survive, but St. Paul police say it’s unclear why the three were shot and whether they were targeted, Sgt. Mike Ernster said.

“They had no issues in the fair, they just came out at the end of the night, walked to their car, and all of a sudden shots rang out and they were hit,” Ernster said.

St. Paul officers responded about 10:20 p.m. to reports of shots fired at 1085 Snelling Av. N., just south of the fairgrounds, Ernster said.

The officers found a teenager with a gunshot wound to the leg, and St. Paul Fire Department medics took him to Regions Hospital. The injury was believed not to be life-threatening.

Around the same time, two more male teenagers from the same incident showed up at area hospitals, Ernster said.

One also had a gunshot wound to the leg, and another, who went to HCMC, was shot in the neck.

No arrests were made as of late Tuesday morning, and investigators are still working to determine what led to the shooting.

“There were a lot of people there,” Ernster said. “It’s baffling to everybody if they were targeted, or why they were targeted.”

The three wounded teenagers knew each other, he said. He asked anyone with information on the incident to call St. Paul police at 651-266-5858 and ask to speak with an investigator.

The two teens shot in the leg are 17 years old, and the one with the neck wound is 18, Ernster said.