'None of us are okay': Doctors, advocates call for gun restrictions after Minneapolis shooting
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A group of Minneapolis doctors and gun violence prevention advocates are calling on the state to pass stricter gun laws after Wednesday’s shooting that killed three people.
Speaking to the press at Minneapolis City Hall Friday, several doctors who responded to the shooting said the violence is taking a toll on medical staff.
Mitch Radin is a doctor at Hennepin Healthcare who leads the organization’s critical incident support team.
“What happened at that apartment building was tragic,” Radin said. “What I want people to understand is that for those who responded to that scene and for those who received those patients at our hospital, gun violence, including mass casualty incidents, is something they are being asked to confront with increasing frequency.”
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Advocates said the suspected shooter should not have been allowed to have a gun, after reportedly threatening several people with it months before the shooting.
Investigators identified the suspected shooter as 35-year-old Carlton Neal Johnson II, a resident of the Shoreline Plaza apartments where he opened fire. The state’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension called the shooting a case of domestic violence that started during a custody handoff of a child.
Johnson shot and killed two residents of the building. He shot and injured several others, including the mother of the child, two employees and two police officers. Johnson was killed by Minneapolis police in an exchange of gunfire, according to the BCA.
Police and county prosecutors were already familiar with Johnson. He had previously made threats against other residents in the apartment, according to law enforcement officials. That prompted managers at the Shoreline Plaza apartments to start the process of evicting Johnson earlier this summer — but he was still living in the building at the time of the shooting.
The Hennepin County Attorney’s Office said they investigated reports of Johnson making threats in June but said there was not enough evidence to charge him. Prosecutors said there also was not enough evidence to order his guns taken away under the state’s red flag law.
That policy allows law enforcement and members of a person’s household to petition a court to issue an extreme risk protection order, allowing law enforcement to temporarily take someone’s firearms, if they believe that person to be a danger to themselves or others.
State Sen. Scott Dibble said that red flag law could use updates to make it easier to enforce, and to make sure law enforcement moves quickly to confiscate weapons.
“This tragedy tells us that we must strengthen that ERPO law, how it is used, make sure law enforcement, prosecutors, courts, families, communities have effective tools to intervene before threats become funerals,” Dibble said.
DFL legislators attempted to enact more gun legislation this year. The Minnesota Senate approved a bill in May that included new restrictions on assault-style weapons and sales of “ghost guns” without serial numbers. It also included school safety and mental health funding. It passed narrowly along party lines in the Senate but didn’t pass the House.
Maggiy Emery is the executive director of Protect Minnesota, a statewide gun violence prevention advocacy group. She said first responders need the help of stronger gun laws to prevent violence.
“We cannot ask these people to simply absorb this forever,” Emery said. “We cannot continue to normalize the trauma of children being shot at school. We cannot continue to normalize police officers being shot while responding to a shooting.”
Tim Kummer, an emergency physician who responded to Wednesday’s shooting, had advocated for that bill, too. Speaking Friday, he said it’s still needed.
“Being back up here one year after Annunciation, knowing really nothing has changed, it does make me wonder: Do those who can make a change actually care about the toll that this takes on us?” Kummer said. “I don't know what it'll take for something to change, but… it should not take another year. It should not take another mass shooting. It should not take one more victim.”
And he said responding to those violent incidents takes a toll on the mental health of his colleagues.
“None of us are okay,” he said.
Dibble said the Legislature will likely revisit gun laws this year. He said it’s too early to know exactly what those proposals might be — and what might have a chance of passing.
