Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara described a terrifying incident for dozens of residents over the weekend after an active shooter wreaked havoc in an apartment building.
It all started Friday night, with dozens of people calling 911 to report a man walking around with a shotgun near Minnehaha Avenue and 40th Street East. Police got there but didn't find the shooter.
Then early Saturday morning, more calls came in reporting shots being fired inside the apartment, as well as glass breaking and someone knocking on their doors.
When officers got to the scene, they found a shotgun and heard more shooting coming from inside. Police then worked to evacuate the building, all while the shooter periodically fired rounds from an AK-47 style rifle.
The suspect was shot by Minneapolis police during an exchange of gunfire and is expected to survive.
Chief O'Hara says it was a dangerous situation for officers on the southside.
"We're going into a building, an apartment building, shots are being fired," O'Hara describes. "People are saying there's somebody banging on my door, there's windows, there's glass breaking. We need our officers to, as quickly as possible, get to the person that's shooting and stop the threat to human life that's there."
He says thankfully there are no reports of anyone else who was hurt in the incident. The man is in custody and remains hospitalized in critical and stable condition.
O'Hara says it was an exhausting week for officers.
"We've had just a terrible amount of shootings and murders over the last week," he says, referring to a number of incidents in areas of South Minneapolis going back to last weekend. "We were hopeful that our city will get a break from some of this violence. It's been an exhausting week for everyone, for the community, for the members of the department involved. But again, just thankful everybody is going to survive here."
Last week, there were five homicides in six days in Minneapolis and it is frustrating Police Chief Brian O'Hara, given that the department is down investigators and struggling to keep up with their caseloads.