WCCO Talks With Protest Shooting Suspect's Father
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- The Hennepin County Attorney's Office has until Monday to decide if it will charge four suspects in Monday night's shooting near the 4th Precinct in north Minneapolis.
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Police named the suspects Wednesday: Joseph Martin Backman, 27; Daniel Thomas Macey, 26; Allen Lawrence Scarsella, 23; and Nathan Wayne Gustavsson, 21.
Dave Backman spoke with his son, Joe, Wednesday night in jail. He came straight to WCCO after his visit.
"I absolutely know that he was not involved in the shooting," Backman said. "He's a really, very curious guy, a poli-sci major. These kinds of social-political kinds of things really interest him. And he was there to observe."
Backman says he thinks his son was arrested because he was in the vicinity of the shooting. He say he is sorry, and his son is sorry for the pain of the victims and their families.
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He says Joe is more concerned with how the victims are doing than his own situation
Backman says his son is an Eagle Scout who is active and interested the outdoors and target shooting. He stresses that his son was raised right.
"He doesn't have a racist bone in his body. He's a very kind person, he was, you know, raised in a home and a school that respect everyone," Backman said.
Backman's son and three other men are under arrest on probable cause of assault.
Scarsella was arrested at the Bloomington home where he rents a room. WCCO has learned officers executed a search warrant at the home, taking cell phones and computers, among other items.
Demonstrators say men fired into a crowd near the 4th police precinct in north Minneapolis Monday night. Bullets hit five protesters who had to go to the hospital.
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Gustavsson is enrolled in the Gunsmithing and Firearms Technology program at Pine Technical and Community College.
Scarsella, Gustavsson, Backman and Macey are in custody at the Hennepin County Jail. County Attorney Mike Freeman says Minneapolis police and federal investigators are working on obtaining evidence against the suspects.
