A man who fatally shot two officers and a firefighter over the weekend has died by suicide. This report comes from the table of the Hennepin County Medical Examiner. Shannon Cortez Gooden, the 38-year-old man, was the culprit of these shootings.
Police responded to an emergency call around 1:50 am on Sunday morning for a report of “a call of a family in danger.” According to Drew Evans, the superintendent of the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension in the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, this was a “domestic violence situation.”
Gooden held seven children inside the house with him at gunpoint. Two of them were his girlfriend’s children, while the other five were his. The children were between the ages of 2 and 15. He barricaded himself in a home in Burnsville with these children and refused entry to the police. He was also armed to the teeth with weapons.
Gooden had several guns with him and large amounts of ammunition. While the police were trying to negotiate with him, he opened fire from different angles of the house. Sadly, he shot and killed two officers on the scene.
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Officers Paul Elmstrand, 27, and Matthew Ruge, 27, both lost their lives that morning. He also fatally shot Adam Finseth, 40, a firefighter and a paramedic. Therefore, three people lost their lives that morning.
However, he also shot another officer, Adam Medlicott, but he is expected to make a full recovery from his injuries. According to Evans, Gooden shot at the police officers from areas such as the “upper portion” and the main floor. The officers also returned fire from outside the home.
At least one of the officers he shot was hit inside the home. After a long time of shooting, the shots finally stopped. However, this was because Gooden committed suicide. Around 8 am on Sunday, officers reported him dead. The medical examiner then confirmed that it was indeed through suicide.
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This is not an uncommon outcome for a situation like this. Many rabid shooters like Gooden know the gravity of their offense. Therefore, they kill themselves so that they wouldn’t have to face the wrath of the law.
For now, police are still investigating the shooting to understand Gooden’s motive. While carrying out their investigations, they discovered court records showing that Gooden was prohibited from owning firearms. This was because he was convicted of second-degree assault in 2007.
He was only 21 years old then. According to his attorney at the time, Mathew K. Higbee, the incident happened in a mall parking lot and involved a knife.
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Higbee tried to reverse this ban in 2020, citing that it was a “harsh” ban. He also argued that Gooden was “not a dangerous criminal” or a “potential risk to the community.” Furthermore, he wrote that Gooden had done everything he could “to put himself back on his feet.”
This included taking anger management classes while in jail and providing for his longtime girlfriend, her two children, and his five children. However, court records show that the judge denied this request. Therefore, it is unclear how he was able to purchase so many firearms.
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