Two police officers and a paramedic in a Minnesota city were fatally shot as they responded to a “domestic-related shooting” on Sunday morning in which a man was barricaded with family members, officials said.
The shooting took place just before 2 a.m. local time in the city of Burnsville, which is about 16 miles south of Minneapolis. The police received a call about a “domestic situation,” the city said in a statement.
“After arriving, the situation escalated into gunfire with responders,” the city said.
Officers Paul Elmstrand and Matthew Ruge, both 27, and a firefighter-paramedic, Adam Finseth, 40, were killed, the city said.
Another officer, Sgt. Adam Medlicott, was injured and taken to a hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening.
The Bureau of Criminal Apprehension of the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, which is investigating the shooting, said that the gunman had also died. He was not publicly identified.
Officer Elmstrand joined the Burnsville Police Department in August 2017 as a community service officer and was promoted to officer in July 2019. Officer Ruge joined the department in April 2020 and was part of its crisis negotiation team and was a physical evidence officer. Mr. Finseth had been a firefighter-paramedic since February 2019, the city said.
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said that its agents from St. Paul were responding to what it described as a “domestic-related shooting” in Burnsville, which has a population of nearly 64,000 residents.
Additional details about what led up to the shooting were not available. The Police Department referred inquiries to a city spokeswoman, who said a news conference was scheduled for Sunday afternoon.
Video from local television stations showed a heavy police presence at the scene.
Alicia McCullum, who moved into the neighborhood in March, lives two houses down from where the shooting happened.
“We woke up and heard gunshots,’’ she said. “We heard one gunshot. Our son came in our room right away, looked out the window and heard three more.”
“We prayed with our neighbors on the phone,” she added. “We are praying because we know that there are seven children in that house.”
Cara Schulz, a City Council member and the acting mayor in Burnsville, said, “We offer our heartfelt condolences to the families of the two police officers and one fire paramedic who were killed in the line of duty and our thoughts are with our police officer who was injured.”
On Facebook, the Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association said, “our law enforcement community is heartbroken.”
“We’re just devastated at the horrific loss,” it said.
Bernard Mokam contributed reporting.