A notebook found in the car of alleged Minnesota assassin Vance Boelter reveals haunting details about his planned attacks.
Authorities say Boelter, 57, began his rampage early Saturday (June 14) morning, fatally shooting former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman, 55, and her husband, Mark Hortman, 58, in their Brooklyn Park home.
Less than 10 kilometers away, the suspect allegedly wounded State Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, at their residence hours earlier, after showing up masked and pretending to be law enforcement.
Boelter also went to the homes of two other lawmakers. One was empty; at the other - Senator Ann Rest’s - a police officer happened to be present, stopping what could have been another deadly strike, CBS News reported.
After the shootings, he texted a chilling group message to his wife and family at around 6:15AM, which read: “Dad went to war last night… I don’t wanna say more because I don’t wanna implicate anybody.
“Words are not gonna explain how sorry I am for this situation… there’s gonna be some people coming to the house armed and trigger-happy and I don’t want you guys around," he added.
The violent spree sparked the largest manhunt in Minnesota state history.
Inside a room Boelter was renting in north Minneapolis, authorities discovered a stack of handwritten notebooks exposing just how calculated his plot was.
According to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Minnesota, the handwritten pages included a rundown of websites the suspect used to dig up the home addresses of 45 state and federal officials, along with detailed family info and surveillance notes.
A GPS device pulled from his SUV logged trips to the homes of Hortman, Hoffman, and two other lawmakers. In addition to this, photos released by the U.S. Attorney’s Office showed the inside of Boelter’s vehicle loaded with assault-style rifles, a tactical vest, stacks of ammo, a flashlight, and a disassembled semiautomatic handgun.
And then there was the mask, a creepy latex disguise of a bald old man, just like the one he was caught wearing in grainy security footage the night the attacks unfolded.
After the brutal murder, Boelter was seen withdrawing cash from a bank while wearing a cowboy hat. He then bought a used Buick sedan and an electric bike, per authorities.
The Buick was later discovered abandoned on Highway 25, with a handwritten note addressed to the FBI inside. “I am the shooter at large in Minnesota involved in the 2 shootings the morning of Saturday, June 15th,” the letter read, signed “Dr. Vance Luther Boelter.”
Boelter’s run ended just a mile from his home. Wendy Thomas, who had stopped at a friend’s house in Green Isle, spotted someone crouching in the grass.
“I’m like, ‘Oh, they’re clearing properties,’” she told NBC News. “And the more my brain registered, I’m like, ‘Dad, there’s only one person. There’s no vehicle.’ And then I started freaking out.”
She flagged down officers nearby. “I started pointing, there he is, there he is,” she recalled. “I didn’t think he was in the area at all. I thought he was long gone.”
Boelter was taken into custody on Sunday (June 15) and appeared in federal court the following day. He’s being held without bail and faces both state and federal charges, including the potential for the death penalty, per CNN.