MINNEAPOLIS – A man indicted Tuesday on charges he fatally shot the Democratic leader in the Minnesota state House and her husband, and wounded another lawmaker and his wife, confessed to the crimes in a rambling handwritten letter to FBI Director Kash Patel, but didn’t say why he targeted the couples, prosecutors said.
Vance Boelter also wrote in the letter that Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz had approached him about killing the state’s two U.S. senators, fellow Democrats Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith.
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Asked by a reporter if all that was a fantasy, acting U.S. Attorney Joseph Thompson replied: “Yes, I agree.”
“There is little evidence showing why he turned to political violence and extremism,” Thompson said. “What he left were lists: politicians in Minnesota, lists of politicians in other states, lists of names of attorneys at national law firms.”
The indictment handed up murder, stalking and firearms charges against Boelter. The murder counts in the deaths of former Democratic House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, could carry the federal death penalty. The indictment also charged Boelter with shooting and wounding a state senator and his wife, and attempting to shoot their adult daughter.
Thompson said a decision on whether to seek the death penalty “will not come for several months” and will be up to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi. Minnesota abolished its state death penalty in 1911, but President Donald Trump's administration says it intends to be aggressive in seeking capital punishment for eligible federal crimes.
Prosecutors initially charged Boelter with the same six counts. But under federal court rules they needed a grand jury indictment to take the case to trial. His arraignment, where he could enter a plea, will probably be scheduled for later in the week, Thompson said
Boelter’s federal defender, Manny Atwal, did not immediately return messages seeking comment on the indictment and the new allegations.
Political extremism as a motive
Thompson also disclosed new details at a news conference. He said investigators had found the handwritten letter, which was addressed to the FBI chief, in a car Boelter abandoned near his home.
"In the letter, Vance Boelter claims that he had been trained by the U.S. military off the books and he had conducted missions on behalf of the U.S. military in Asia, the Middle East and Africa,” Thompson said.
The letter doesn’t specifically say though why he targeted the Hortmans and Hoffmans.
Boelter's political and religious views
Friends have described Boelter as an evangelical Christian with politically conservative views who had been struggling to find work. At a hearing July 3, Boelter said he was “looking forward to the facts about the 14th coming out.”
In an interview published by the New York Post on Saturday, Boelter insisted the shootings had nothing to do with his opposition to abortion or his support for Trump, but he declined to discuss why he allegedly killed the Hortmans and wounded the Hoffmans.
“You are fishing and I can’t talk about my case…I’ll say it didn’t involve either the Trump stuff or pro life,” Boelter wrote in a message to the newspaper via the jail’s messaging system.
Boelter also faces state murder and attempted murder charges in Hennepin County, but the federal case will go first.
Other details of the case
Prosecutors say Boelter, 57, who has lived in rural Sibley County south of Minneapolis, was disguised as a police officer, driving a fake squad car, wearing a realistic rubber mask and wearing tactical gear around 2 a.m. on June 14 when he went to the home of Sen. John Hoffman, a Democrat, and his wife, Yvette, in the Minneapolis suburb of Champlin. He allegedly shot the senator nine times, and Yvette Hoffman eight times, but they survived. He also allegedly tried to kill their adult daughter, Hope, but they pushed her out of the way and she was not hit.
Prosecutors allege he then stopped at the homes of two other lawmakers. One wasn't home while a police officer may have scared him off from the other target. Boelter then allegedly went to the Hortmans' home in nearby Brooklyn Park and killed both of them. Their dog was so gravely injured that he had to be euthanized.
Brooklyn Park police, who had been alerted to the shootings of the Hoffmans, arrived at the Hortman home around 3:30 a.m., moments before the gunman opened fire on the couple, court documents said. Boelter allegedly fled and left behind his car, which contained notebooks listing dozens of Democratic officials as potential targets with their home addresses, as well as five guns and a large quantity of ammunition.
Thompson said the gun used to shoot the Hoffmans was found near the Hortman home, while the gun used to shoot the Hortmans was recovered from a pond near their home a few days later.
Law enforcement officers finally captured Boelter about 40 hours later, about a mile (1.6 kilometers) from his rural home in Green Isle, after what authorities called the largest search for a suspect in state history.
Remembering the victims
Sen. Hoffman is out of the hospital and is now at a rehabilitation facility, his family announced last week, adding he has a long road to recovery. Yvette Hoffman was released a few days after the attack.
Hope Hoffman said in a statement Tuesday that she was relieved that Boelter will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
“Though I was not shot physically, I will now forever coexist with the PTSD of watching my parents be nearly shot dead in front of me and seeing my life flash before my eyes with a gun in my face,” she said.
Hortman led the House from 2019 until January and was a driving force as Democrats passed an ambitious list of liberal priorities in 2023. She yielded the speakership to a Republican in a power-sharing deal after the November elections left the House tied, and she took the title speaker emerita.
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Associated Press reporter Ed White in Detroit contributed to this report.