Suspect in downtown shooting charged with murder
After police moved a group of arguing people outside a Block E movie theatre about midnight Friday, suspect Derick D. Holliday, 21, pulled a handgun, fired it in the air and started chasing a man who fled on foot, said murder charges filed today.
Holliday, of Minneapolis, fired repeatedly at the fleeing man as he fled through a parking lot by Sixth Street. He missed his target, but a bullet hit and killed Alan Reitter, who was walking with friends by the parking lot.
Holliday tried to enter the Karma Bar, but employees stopped him until Officer Jomar Villamor arrived and arrested him. He was charged today in Hennepin County District Court with first-degree murder, attempted murder and first-degree assault for aiming a gun at an officer.
"This is premeditation because Holliday deliberately fired multiple gunshots as he chased after another person on a crowded street," said County Attorney Amy Klobuchar. "The intent follows the bullet."
2 Arrested in Fatal Uptown Shooting
A woman and a juvenile male were arrested without incident about 5 p.m. near 33rd and Emerson Avenues N., according to police.
Zebuhr, 25, was shot in the head about 9:55 p.m. on a Saturday when two males approached him, his mother, his sister and a friend as they returned to their car after having dinner at Calhoun Square. They robbed his mother and reportedly fled in a white car.
The victims didn't resist and did everything they should have in a robbery, police have said, adding that the shooting was an aberration.
Police say Uptown shooter is in custody
A 17-year-old boy and a 22-year-old Minneapolis woman were arrested Monday when the department's Violent Crime Apprehension Team spotted the teenager getting into a car near 33rd and Emerson Avenues N. Police said they are still searching for three more juveniles, one of whom is charged in connection with the death of Michael Zebuhr.
"We are extremely confident that the person responsible for the shooting is the 17-year-old" arrested Monday afternoon, said Assistant Police Chief Timothy Dolan.
Of the five suspects, only the woman arrested is an adult. Authorities have issued an arrest warrant for another juvenile involved, who wasn't identified.
2 arrested after car sought in Uptown case found burning
A burning car that police found in Brooklyn Park turned out to be the vehicle robbers used to flee the scene of the shooting of a man in the Uptown area of Minneapolis.
Minneapolis police had been asking for the public's help Tuesday in finding a white 1994 Ford Taurus with a Minnesota license plate number of GFG 527. About 10 p.m., several people called Brooklyn Park police about an explosion in the 6500 block of 66th Avenue N., said Capt. Greg Roehl. The callers also gave police a description of two people leaving the scene in a car.
A 33-year-old Minneapolis man and a 22-year-old Duluth woman were booked on suspicion of arson. One of them is related to a juvenile suspect who is still being sought in the shooting death.
Minneapolis police Capt. Rich Stanek said police had not been seeking the two people arrested Tuesday by Brooklyn Park police. Investigators are trying to determine if the two are connected to Zebuhr's death. Stanek reiterated that anybody who interfered with the investigation or aided any suspects could face criminal charges.
Well, it seems that they're narrowing in on the suspects on pretty quickly. I'm glad to hear it. It's a damn shame that someone had to die before they brought some of our police back to the neighborhood though.
Victim of downtown random shooting identified
A bystander was killed late Friday near Block E in downtown Minneapolis, prompting questions about the area's safety.
Police and community leaders said the shooting of Reitter near the Block E entertainment complex was a senseless act, and the death raised questions about safety downtown and led to calls for renewed efforts to stop gun violence in the city.
About a minute after the 11:35 p.m. shooting, police arrested a 21-year-old Minneapolis man, after a foot chase.
Numerous officers had converged on the area in response to a large fight and a report of shots being fired. But Dolan said the suspect has told police that he was not being threatened or assaulted, nor was he trying to defend himself when he began firing shots.
The suspect "just shot into a crowd of people," Dolan said.
Police said multiple shots were fired.
Reitter, the victim, was not involved in the fight. He was struck in the head as he was walking with friends. He died later at Hennepin County Medical Center.
Chris Greising, a worker at the Borders bookstore in Block E, was upstairs right before the shooting, looking at lines of perhaps 200 people outside the theater. Suddenly the crowd started running and screaming, and he heard at least two gunshots, he said.
"It was just sort of anarchy," he said of the people scattering. More than a dozen people started to rush into the bookstore, prompting Greising to call his manager and say, "We need to close now."
Man Shot In Head During Uptown Robbery
A 25-year-old man is in critical condition after a Saturday night shooting in Uptown.The man was walking with his mother, sister and her friend after they finished dinner in a restaurant at Hennepin Avenue and Lake Street.
According to police, two men approached the group about 10 p.m. at 31st Street and Girard Avenue South. The suspects allegedly stole the mother's purse. Then, even though the victims didn't put up a fight, the suspects allegedly fired two shots, hitting the man in the head.
Ronald Barry, who lives in the apartment building next to where the shooting occurred said, "I heard the shots ... a lady screaming. I called 911 and ran to their aid. There was obviously nothing I could do for the guy. I mean, it was a horrible sight."
The victim's mother was visiting from Virginia. The group was attacked only blocks away from the restaurant where they ate.
Kris Arenson, an inspector from the Minneapolis Police Department said, "Usually when the purse is given up, or even if the purse isn't given up, we haven't had any (people) that have been shot."
Police said the suspects immediately fled the scene, jumped into a white car and headed south on Girard Avenue.
While the area is not known for violence, resident Justin Ellis wasn't surprised there would be a robbery outside his building. "Last summer, I was walking to my car early in the morning before work, I had an early meeting, and I got mugged," Ellis said. That day, Ellis got away, but a woman on Hennepin Avenue didn't.
Police gave vague descriptions of the suspects, only saying they are men between 17 years old and 22 years old and were both wearing dark clothing. Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call the Minneapolis Police Department at 612-692-8477.
Victim of Uptown shooting dies
Minneapolis police said today that a man who was critically wounded in a shooting in Uptown on Saturday night died Sunday.
Robberies in Minneapolis' Uptown area, where Michael Zebuhr of Buckhannon, W. Va., was shot, have spiked several times in the past year. That brought an increased police presence, arrests and a temporary lull in Uptown robberies, police leaders say.
Police have been focusing patrols on the nearby Whittier and Stevens Square neighborhoods along Franklin Avenue, which have traditionally had more of the Fifth Precinct's street crime, said Inspector Kris Arneson. That may have pushed crime toward Uptown, she said.
Residents and business owners share police concern about the violent, but unusual, robbery.
Zebuhr was shot about 10 p.m. while returning to a car with his mother and two others from an Uptown restaurant.
He was a 2005 graduate of Davis & Elkins College in Elkins, W. Va., and is a graduate student in bioengineering at Clemson University in Clemson, S.C. He was in Minneapolis to visit his sister with their mother, Suzanne Strong. Police said Zebuhr was shot after two men grabbed his mother's purse. Police had made no arrests Monday, and they said there may also have been more suspects in a getaway vehicle.
Arneson noted that robbery has increased in the precinct this year, but not significantly in Uptown, where crime often occurs just outside the commercial hub on side streets.
Police say street crimes like robbery seem to be moving south and west from the Whittier and Stevens Square neighborhoods toward Hennepin and Lake.
Robberies in the Fifth Precinct have increased 43 percent to about 100 so far this year over last, Arneson said. Citywide, robberies grew 39 percent in the same period, according to police data through March 13.
Authorities said that despite the violence of Saturday's robbery, few victims are shot if they oblige a robber's request.
It is unclear whether Saturday's incident is linked to other cases. Lubinski said there were no "strong constant" patterns in robberies this year, which are up in each precinct.
Anyone with information about the robbery is asked to call 612-692-TIPS.
This was just 4 blocks from my apartment. And they did everything you're supposed to if you get mugged. Everything. And this guy still got shot. I'm about ready to move to the country.
