ST. PAUL, MN — Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher's public warning about Somali gang violence has drawn a formal rebuke from a Minneapolis City Council member, who says the sheriff's rhetoric is dangerous and unfairly targets an entire community.
Fletcher raised the issue in a livestreamed video posted to his "Live on Patrol" social media pageson Monday, a day after a violent holiday weekend that included multiple shootings and at least one homicide in Minneapolis.
He called the violence "out of control" and said his office has identified about 12 Somali gangs operating in Minnesota, with some members linked to gangs in Ohio.
"We've got a huge list of criminal activity, but having said that, we're not indicting the whole community, just the 1 to 3 percent that cause the problems," Fletcher said in the video.
Deputy Ben Seidl, an investigator who works Somali gang cases and is also assigned to a Minneapolis police firearms unit, said the state's largest Somali gang is based in Minneapolis and has been feuding with suburban groups since the end of 2022.
He said the violence is typically driven by social media rivalries and "bragging rights" rather than drug sales, and that it has repeatedly surfaced at high-profile events including graduations and the State Fair.
Minneapolis City Council Vice President Jamal Osman responded with a formal statement on July 7, saying he was "dismayed and deeply disappointed" by Fletcher's comments.
Osman said the sheriff's remarks painted Somali youth as the source of most, if not all, community violence, and went further by attempting to connect local youth violence to terrorist organizations abroad.
"That kind of rhetoric is not only wrong, it is dangerous," Osman said in the statement. "It targets an entire community, creates fear, and makes it harder to build the trust we need to actually keep people safe."
Osman said the focus should instead be on longstanding issues such as disinvestment, poverty, lack of opportunity and social isolation.
He also said this was not the first time Fletcher had singled out ethnic or racial communities during his time in office, calling it a pattern that shows a troubling willingness to sow division and "stoke racial resentment."
CAIR-MN Deputy Executive Director Suleiman Adan said the organization takes the recent crimes seriously but called Fletcher's "Somali gang problem" framing particularly dangerous, according to KSTP.
Ramsey County Attorney John Choi agreed there is a growing pattern of retaliatory violence among teens and young adults in the Twin Cities, though he cautioned against calling it a trend specific to the Somali community, according to the Minnesota Star Tribune.
Fletcher, who said he has worked in the gang field since 1977, defended his approach in a follow-up video Wednesday, pointing to the county's experience addressing Hmong gang violence in the 1990s as a model for the current situation. He said acknowledging a problem is the first step toward solving it.
"If we stay in denial, those 300 kids that are running in the gang circles are going to turn into 900 kids," Fletcher said.
The Ramsey County Sheriff's Office is holding a community meeting for Somali parents and leaders on July 21 at 6 p.m. at its patrol station, 1411 Paul Kirkwold Drive in Arden Hills.
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