Three people including a gunman are dead after a shooting at a northeastern Minnesota hotel Monday night.
Cloquet police responded around 6:30 p.m. after an employee at the Super 8 hotel reported that one of their co-workers had been attacked. Police arrived and found a 22-year-old woman suffering from a gunshot wound, she later died at a hospital. Police then found a 35-year-old man dead from a gunshot wound inside of a car in the hotel's parking lot.
"Based on what officers found, we believed there was an active shooter situation," said Cloquet police chief Derek Randall. "We took a cautious approach and issued an alert until more information about the suspect's whereabouts was know. We immediately sent out a shelter in place alert for that vicinity."
Police issued an alert at about 7 p.m. about an active shooter at a Super 8 motel in Cloquet and warned people in the surrounding area of Big Lake Road and Highway 33 to shelter in place.
The order was lifted about 90 minutes later after police reported finding the suspected shooter dead and announced there wasn’t any active threat.
A 32-year-old Ramsey man was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound outside of the hotel.
"As responding officers secured the scenes, the used hotel video surveillance to determine that the assailant was one of the deceased individuals," Randall said. "At that time we sent out another update notifying the public that we believed the suspect was deceased."
Randall said based on video footage that the attack started inside of the hotel with the 22-year-old woman being the first victim. The suspect reportedly walked out of the hotel, shot the second victim, and then walked a short distance before taking his own life.
Other details, including a possible motive for the attack, weren’t immediately released.
“I am praying for those killed in another senseless act of gun violence tonight in Cloquet,” Gov. Tim Walz said in a social media post. “To the law enforcement officers who responded, thank you. The state stands ready to provide continued support to local authorities.”
Cloquet is about 20 miles west of Duluth and partly lies within the Fond du Lac Indian Reservation.