A teenager in possession of a so-called "ghost gun" fitted with a binary trigger shot his friend inside his New Hope home last week, leaving the 17-year-old boy gravely wounded, according to new criminal charges.
A juvenile petition filed against the suspect, a 17-year-old New Hope boy, said two witnesses described to investigators that the two friends were laughing and joking around in the moments before the shots were fired around 1:30 p.m. on Sept. 18.
Charges filed Monday state the victim had "no brainwave activity and is being kept alive on life support" at the time the complaint was written.
The allegations
According to the petition, the suspect called 911 the afternoon of the shooting and reported that he thought his friend had shot himself.
When police arrived, they found the victim laying on the couch and determined he had no pulse.
Nearby, officers located a 9mm Polymer80 handgun.
According to the charges, the unserialized, untraceable firearm was found to be "ghost gun", which had potentially been assembled from a kit.
Investigators discovered the handgun had a binary trigger, which causes one round to be fired when the trigger is pulled and a second round to be fired when the trigger is released.
The suspect allegedly told investigators he'd been awoken by the sound of the gunshot when he discovered his friend of four years "down on the couch," the petition states.
Two witnesses who spoke to investigators contradicted the suspect's statement.
One witness said she'd seen the victim return from the gas station with a bag of snacks and saw the suspect in the bedroom on his bed, appearing to have just woken up.
She said the teens were having a conversation as the victim appeared to be getting ready to sit on the couch.
She told investigators the friends were "giggling" and "laughing" and then she heard a gunshot.
Another witness described the scene similarly, telling investigators the suspect and victim were "joking around" before the shooting.
The witness, who was sitting in the living room, said the suspect was sitting up in bed and the victim was leaning over him asking for a vape.
The witness said he'd turned his attention to his phone when he heard a gunshot, the petition details. He then said he saw the suspect holding the victim and crying "No, no, no!"
The witness said he didn't see either person with a gun at anytime during the incident, but confirmed the suspect and victim had been playing with the firearm and taking videos and pictures with it throughout the night.
During a forensic investigation of the room where the victim was shot, investigators located a bullet hole along the ceiling with blood splatter on the ground below.
Investigators also located a second bullet hole in the floorboard and two bullets were recovered from the scene.
Based on the witness statements and the relative positions of the bullet holes, police determined the suspect discharged the firearm that struck the victim in the eye, the petition alleges.
Additionally, further examination of the firearm confirmed one single function of the trigger releases the firing pin twice.
The suspect is charged in juvenile court with one count of first-degree assault and one count of possession of a machine gun.
Binary trigger ban
A new law banning binary triggers in Minnesota is set to take effect Jan. 1, 2025 .
The triggers, which increase the rate of fire, became a focus of lawmakers in the wake of the Burnsville shooting that killed three first responders in February.
One of the semiautomatic rifles used by the suspect in that incident featured a binary trigger, federal charges allege .
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