A person was killed Saturday night in a shooting aboard a Green Line light rail train near Westgate Station, close to the border between Minneapolis and St. Paul. Police swarmed the station shortly after 9 p.m. local time, and officers were still piecing together what happened as of early Sunday.
According to KSTP, multiple law enforcement agencies converged on Westgate Station on University Avenue around 9 p.m. for what was described as an emergency incident. Minneapolis police confirmed they were investigating the shooting death of an adult, though the station sits within St. Paul city limits near the Minneapolis border. Further details were expected to be released Sunday morning, the station reported.
The jurisdictional picture grew more tangled as the night went on. Per FOX 9, St. Paul police directed reporters to Metro Transit Police, which in turn said Minneapolis police were serving as the lead agency on the investigation. Officers were seen working both the Westgate platform and the interior of a train car as the probe unfolded, the station noted.
Scene Unfolds Near KSTP Building
The shooting took place outside the KSTP building near the Minneapolis-St. Paul line, the same account from KSTP indicates. Reporters on scene described a heavy police presence at the station as investigators worked through the night. By the time coverage wrapped, no additional details on the victim had been made public, while police were searching for the suspect.
A System Already Under Strain
The shooting lands against a backdrop of documented struggles on the region's light rail system. Metro Transit Police Chief Ernest Morales told CBS News Minnesota that crime on the light rail rose 25% from 2022 to 2023, even as incidents were trending downward by the end of that year. The department has also acknowledged it remains roughly 60 officers short of what it considers proper staffing, prompting $8,000 signing bonuses and other incentives to attract recruits.
Ridership during that same stretch climbed 15% from 2022 to 2023 but still sat at only 60% of pre-pandemic levels, per the same CBS News Minnesota report. Lawmakers have also been briefed on the issue: a report from the Minnesota House described Metro Transit's top law enforcement official presenting crime statistics and outlining efforts to combat a spike in incidents across the agency's bus and train systems.
Violence on the Green Line is not without precedent. CBS News Minnesota has reported that a man was shot during a robbery on a train in St. Paul and was expected to recover, and a separate account from BringMeTheNews described a man shot in the leg on a Green Line train in March 2022. Neither incident's full details were independently confirmed in connection with Saturday's shooting.
For now, the investigation into Saturday's deadly shooting remains open, with Minneapolis and Metro Transit police investigating. By early Sunday, reports said the gunman had left the train and police were searching for the suspect. No information about a motive or the exact circumstances of the shooting had been released as of early Sunday.
