Heavy snow and difficult travel expected again, heaviest snow in southern Minnesota

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

The man charged with killing the top Democrat in the Minnesota House and her husband, and wounding a state senator and his wife, pleaded not guilty during his arraignment in federal court on Thursday.

The plea during the brief hearing in federal court in Minneapolis was expected; an attorney for Vance Boelter 

 on six counts of murder, stalking and firearms violations. The murder charges could carry the 

, though prosecutors say that decision is several months away.

Wearing an orange jail sweatshirt, yellow pants, and orange canvas shoes, Boelter stood unshackled at the courtroom lectern beside defense attorney Manny Atwal. 

“Are you ready to be arraigned?” asked Magistrate Judge Dulce Foster. 

“Yes, your honor,” Boelter replied. Atwal then entered not guilty pleas to all six counts on her client’s behalf. 

Assistant U.S. Attorney Harry Jacobs said that the government is sifting through hundreds of gigabytes and tens of thousands of pages of evidence. 

Foster gave prosecutors two months to disclose the discovery to the defense. She scheduled another status conference for Nov. 12, but did not set a trial date or a deadline for prosecutors to give notice on whether they plan to seek the death penalty.

Acting U.S. Attorney Joe Thompson said in July that that a decision on whether to seek capital punishment is months away and will ultimately be made by Attorney General Pam Bondi with input from Minnesota federal prosecutors and the victims’ families.

In addition to Atwal, a federal public defender based in Minneapolis, Boelter’s defense team includes Las Vegas-based federal defenders Kimberly Sharkey and Ryan Norwood. Sharkey is chief of the death penalty unit in the federal public defender’s office.

When they announced the indictment, federal prosecutors released a rambling handwritten letter they say Boelter wrote to FBI Director Kash Patel. In it, Boelter allegedly confessed to the June 14 shootings of 

, but it does not make clear why he targeted the Hortmans or Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, 

Atwal said at the time that the weighty charges did not come as a surprise, but she has not commented on the substance of the allegations or any potential defense strategies.

Noting the voluminous evidence, Foster also granted a government request to designate the case as “complex” so that standard speedy trial requirements won’t apply.

“The investigation of this case arose out of 

 in Minnesota’s history,” prosecutors wrote in a filing. "Accordingly, the discovery to be produced by the government will include a substantial amount of investigative material and reports from more than a dozen different law enforcement agencies at the federal, state, and local levels.”

They said the evidence will include potentially thousands of hours of video footage, tens of thousands of pages of responses to dozens of grand jury subpoenas, and data from numerous electronic devices seized during the investigation.

 Friends have described him as an evangelical Christian with 

 to find work. Authorities said Boelter made 

 in Minnesota and other states — all or mostly Democrats.

 through his jail’s electronic messaging service, Boelter suggested his actions were partly rooted in the Christian commandment to love one’s neighbor. “Because I love my neighbors prior to June 14th I conducted a 2 year long undercover investigation,” he wrote.

, Boelter insisted the shootings had nothing to do with his opposition to abortion or his support for President Donald Trump, but he declined to elaborate.

“There is little evidence showing why he turned to political violence and extremism,” the acting U.S. attorney for Minnesota, Joe Thompson, told reporters last month. He also reiterated that prosecutors consider Hortman’s killing a “political assassination.”

Prosecutors say Boelter was disguised as a police officer and driving a fake squad car early June 14 when he went to the Hoffmans’ home in the Minneapolis suburb of Champlin. He shot the senator nine times, and his wife eight times, officials said.

Boelter later went to the Hortmans’ home in nearby Brooklyn Park and killed both of them, authorities said. Their dog was so 

 that he had to be euthanized. Boelter 

Crime, Law and Justice

Politics and Government News

Homepage

Minnesota lawmaker shootings

The Associated Press

Author

MPR News Staff

The man charged with killing the top Democrat in the Minnesota House and her husband, and wounding a state senator and his wife, pleaded not guilty during his arraignment in federal court on Thursday.


Man charged with shooting Minnesota lawmakers pleads not guilty

Go Deeper.

Like this?