New Details Emerge in Cloquet Hotel Shooting, Suspected Shooter Sent Cryptic Message Before Attack

In a recent development concerning the Cloquet hotel shooting that claimed three lives, authorities disclosed new details about the incidents on January 8. According to CBS News Minnesota, the suspected shooter, identified as Nicholas Elliot Lenius, 32, sent an alarming Snapchat message to his work supervisor moments before the violence erupted, writing "WTF is going on."

The supervisor received Lenius's message and correspondingly initiated a phone call with him at approximately 6:30 p.m., around the same time another hotel employee contacted the police per Northern News Now. Surveillance footage indicates that Lenius appeared to be engrossed in a phone conversation during the time of the attack, after which officers found a camera inside his truck outside the Super 8 hotel that was "actively recording."

Cloquet Police Department identified the victims as 35-year-old Patrick Jeffrey Roers from Deer River, and Cloquet's own Shellby Marie Trettel, aged 22; authorities allege that Lenius fatally shot Trettel, who was clerking at the Super 8, and then Roers before turning the gun on himself. The motives behind the shooting still elude the police, with no discernible connection between the victims and the shooter unearthed at this juncture.

Continuing the investigation with help from the Minnesota BCA, police are scrutinizing the evidence that includes video footage from the camera found in Lenius's truck, the hotel room he accessed, along with what is believed to be Lenius's cell phone. Despite efforts to unravel the reason behind the double murder-suicide, the instigation that drove Lenius to commit such acts remains obscured by the shadow of uncertainty.