Police: Minneapolis shooter released 'manifesto' with 'disturbing writings'

The United States flag outside the White House has been lowered to half staff as the nation mourns two children ages eight and ten who were killed in a shooting at the Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis earlier today. The children were sitting with classmates in church pews during a mass. At least 17 others are wounded, 14 of them children as young as six years old. We just learned the three adult victims are parishioners in their 80s. The Minneapolis Police Chief just

moments ago said all of the injured victims are expected to survive. The school includes students pre K through 8th grade. This was the first week of school. The mayor of Minneapolis today

expressing profound grief and frankly also some anger at the failure of our leaders to take sufficient meaningful action to prev of massacres like these i

Don't just say this is ab right now. These kids wer It was the first week of

in a church moments ago, Tim Wall said these kids find learning and curiosi

met with something very d met with evil and horror often come to these and s tragedies or there's no w shouldn't be words for this. There shou types of incidents because

happen. Police say the sh inflicted gunshot wound af weapons to shoot dozens o windows from outside the still working to determin on the ample evidence the

They did say the shooter determine a motive based shooter left behind. They did not have an extensive

We're also aware of a man had time to be released o appeared to show him at t some disturbing writings.

are evaluating, in addition to the manifesto, a series of videos posted to YouTube by a user identified as Robin W. They are trying to authenticate them and potentially learn more about the motivations

in this horrific attack. The videos, which have been taken down, were first uploaded earlier today, before the shooting. We have a lot more, and there's a lot of breaking news about this horrific incident. CNN law enforcement correspondent Whitley Wild

is on the scene in Minneapolis with the latest on what we know about how this shooting unfolded.

There are no words that can capture the horror and the evil of this unspeakable act. Children are dead.

A peaceful start to the day ends in tragedy after a gunman opens fire during mass that. Children are dead. ends in tragedy after a g mass at a catholic church

killing two Children. The you seem a lot more medic

before 8 30 this morning. dozens of Children were i

like shots fired and then we kind of like got under the pews. It kind of, um, they shot through the stained glass windows I think and it was really scary. And I just ran under the pew and then I covered my head. My friend like saved me though because he laid on top of me, but he got hit. He went to the hospital. I was like two seats away from the stained glass windows.

So they were like, the shots were like right next to me.

Monday marked their first day back at the preschool through eighth grade school.

During the mass, a gunman approached on the outside, on the side of the building, and began firing a rifle through the church windows towards the children sitting in the pews at the mess. Two young children, ages eight and 10, were killed where they sat in the pews.

Minneapolis police rushed to the scene and entered the church to try and provide first aid to victims and also rescue some of the children who were hiding in the building.

You cannot put into words the gravity, the tragedy, or the absolute pain of this situation.

This man lives near the church and heard the gunfire.

I said there's no way that that could be gunfire, there was so much of it, so it was sporadic.

He rushed to the scene an

as he came out of the chu

like just a normal sunday full of people and Childr know, when the firing, he it went on for eternity, just he ran out of the bu

being treated at local ho Hennepin Healthcare, which says many of its victims are young. The chair of emergency medicine at the hospital says four of the patients required surgery.

Nine of the 11 patients were pediatric ages. Remember the exact ages, I believe it's six all the way up to 14. That's the range.

Police say the investigation is just beginning and that the gunman was in his early 20s and armed with a rifle, a

shotgun and a pistol. This was a deliberate act of violence against innocent children and other people worshiping. The coward who fired these shots ultimately took his own life in the rear of the church. This kind of act of evil should never happen.

And it happens far too often.

Jake, anyone with children at a Catholic school, at a religious school knows how important that first day is, that moment when everyone goes to mass. And quite often that special experience to kick off the school year is shared with family members. What is abundantly clear here, after hearing from the principal and the mayor, is that

what was supposed to be a very special day has been completely destroyed, lives upended. This has reached the pope. The Vatican sent his deepest sorrows to the archdiocese here, who read a statement from Pope Leo earlier today. We'll have much more on that later in the show, Jake.

But back to the investigation. What we know now is that police are looking into a series of quite bizarre videos. Some of them are rambling. Some of the information indicates that he had this real obsession with shooters and shows rambling written statements. Jake, finally, what we know is that the firearms were purchased legally and recently.

Jake? Whitney Wild in Minneapolis, thanks so much. And we are learning a lot of new information about the shooter. We are trying to verify it and make sure it's accurate before we bring any information to you. A video posted on YouTube does appear to show the shooter rambling saying things such as I don't remember how far I went and there's bugs in my

skin and I can't deal with this anymore. We saw a person flipping through notebook pages with indiscernible writing some pages showed dates including today's date August 27th in a different video you hear the shooter shooter referencing a message left to the family. Here's my note to my family. It's bringing CNN's Brian Todd who is tracking part of this part of the story. Brian, what else are we learning about the shooter?

Jake, we've obtained significant new information on the shooter. Here's what we can tell you right now. The FBI has identified the shooter as Robin Westman, 23 years old. The agency is calling this quote a domestic and active domestic terrorism,

but the police say they do not have a motive yet to establish it as a hate crime. Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara says Westman has no prior criminal history. The shooter was armed with a rifle, shotgun and a pistol,

which the police chief said all were obtained recently and legally. They were purchased by the shooter, according to a yearbook obtained by CNN. Westman graduated from excuse me from Annunciation Catholics grade school in 2017.

According to a social media post, Westman's mother previously worked at Annunciation from 2016 through 2021. Police are investigating as Whitney pointed out a moment ago, online video of the shooting The suspect's mother previously worked at Annunciation from 2016 through 2021. Police are investigating, as Whitney pointed out a moment ago, online videos apparently posted by the shooter which describe an obsession with school shootings.

The videos show a rambling written statement with guns painted with slurs with the names of mass killers, including the shooter at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012, and also some political messages in that rambling written statement. In the videos, which are titled with Westman's full name, the person recording them pages through this handwritten notebook. The notebook describes feelings of self-hatred and wishes to die, and the words, I'm so sorry, are written in large letters on one page.

The notebook also includes a diagram of the inside of a church, which appears to match the layout of Annunciation Catholic Church. The person recording shows themselves stabbing a knife into that drawing of the layout of that church, while saying the words,

quote, ha, nice. Jake, again, piecing together this information, all of it, incredibly disturbing. And again, ascing together this information, all of it, incredibly disturbing. And again, as I think people have been pointing out since this happened, you know, you see obviously some real clues here

as to what a motive could be, as to what a motive could be, but they're not saying formally what it is yet.