A suspect is in custody and one person is dead after several people were wounded in a shooting at a health clinic in Buffalo, Minnesota, police said.
One person died and four others were wounded in the shooting that happened on Tuesday morning inside the Allina Clinic Crossroads campus in the city of about 15,000 people. Police announced the suspect in the shooting is 67-year-old Gregory Ulrich of Buffalo. Three of the victims are in critical, but stable, condition, and a fourth has been released, according to the Associated Press.
Wright County Sheriff Sean Deringer said Ulrich is “no stranger to law enforcement” and that his office has responded to calls about the man for years. He offered no further detail about the nature of those calls or any prior criminal history, but Ulrich was reportedly ordered to have no contact with a man whose name matches that of a doctor at the clinic.
“All I can say is, it’s a history that spans several years, and there’s certainly a history of him being unhappy with healthcare … with the healthcare that he’d received,” Buffalo Police Chief Pat Budke said of Ulrich during an emotional statement at a news conference.
Derringer said that when his team arrived at the scene, they located several victims. Once the victims were removed from the building, the team discovered a “suspicious package in the corner of the lobby,” he said.
Aerial footage of the building shows several windows that appear to be broken out and shows law enforcement keeping a distance from the building. At about 1:15 p.m. local time, a truck with the Minneapolis bomb squad was seen pulling into the driveway leading up to the building’s entrance as other law enforcement vehicles remained at a distance, parked near the road.
Buffalo Police Chief Pat Budke said that the active shooter situation was contained before noon. FBI spokesman Kevin Smith said bomb technicians were dispatched to the scene, but it isn’t clear if explosives were actually involved.
The Minnesota State Patrol said in a tweet that it flew six boxes of blood from the Red Cross to a hospital in Buffalo in response to the event. A law enforcement source told FOX 9 that there are at least nine victims and that some of them are in critical condition.
There are also reports that a Super 8 motel in the city had been evacuated and that law enforcement and the bomb squad had arrived at the building. It isn’t clear if the two incidents are related.
Bomb squad , ambulance and more law enforcement arriving… Legion and speedway along w/ motel evacuated pic.twitter.com/sUxza5UiD2
— Karen Scullin FOX9 (@kscullinfox9) February 9, 2021
Businesses and schools around the area of the incident have been put on lockdown, according to KARE11.
Gov. Tim Walz addressed the shooting during a pre-planned media appearance on Tuesday afternoon. He said that he spoke with the mayor of Buffalo and thanked law enforcement officers who responded to the scene of the shooting.
“It does sound like it was one individual. It does sound like a firearm was involved, as well as improvised explosive devices,” Walz said, adding that he has no information about a potential motive for the shooting.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey addressed the violence in a tweet, saying that some of the city’s units have been moved to Buffalo to assist with the situation.
“There is an unspeakable depravity in doing harm to those who work to heal us. Those who have stepped up and risked their own health for ours,” he said. “Our first responders are on their way to the scene to help. Today, Minneapolis stands with our neighbors in Buffalo.”
The Washington Examiner reached out to Allina for more details but did not immediately receive a response.
