The man who exchanged gunfire with Hennepin County deputies Wednesday during an exchange of gunfire that killed him and two of the wounded deputies was not the subject of the arrest warrant that they were there to execute, according to emergency dispatch audio and confirmed by a police source. .
Clint Hoyhtya, 28, was identified as the man who died in the shooting shortly before 11:30 a.m. when officers arrived with the arrest warrant at his home in the 13400 block of E. Crestwood Drive. But a police source and audio from an emergency dispatch confirm that he was not named in the warrant that law enforcement was there to execute.
The two deputies injured in the shooting are expected to survive. One was taken to the hospital with “very serious injuries,” Sheriff Dawanna Witt said. The other was treated for gunshot wounds and released at the scene, she said.
At the news conference, law enforcement officials declined to provide many details about what happened, including what precipitated the shooting, who fired the first shots or whether the he man described as an “armed individual” died from secondary gunfire or his own weapon.
The arrest warrant for the 34-year-old man is one of three arrest warrants still in effect as of Thursday afternoon. Two involve violating domestic violence no-contact orders and another involves illegal possession of weapons. The most recent of them was posted a day before deputies went to the Minnetonka home, according to court records. The Star Tribune is not naming the man because he has not been charged in connection with the shooting.
The same officials have not yet released the name of the deceased man, but the Star Tribune confirmed his identity late Wednesday afternoon as Hoyhtya, who was described on audio of the dispatch as wearing a bulletproof vest and had an “AK variant,” a reference to a high-powered firearm, next to his body following the shooting.
“The suspect is in the yard, he ended up shooting at us, giving him orders at that point,” according to the audio, which also recounted a lengthy scene in which Hoyhtya’s body remained in the yard until ‘so that law enforcement could determine with robots and cameras that no one else was in the house.
Thomas Hoyhtya, the father of the man who owned the house, initially called his son’s death a “suicide by cop.” However, he called the Star Tribune Thursday morning and said that “the police shot the wrong guy. … They broke down the door, he was in the back and was probably playing video games. It was his day off.”
He explained that his sister was living in the house without his permission in late 2021, once their mother had moved into an aged care facility, and that the sister had also allowed other people to reside there.
He said the subject of the warrant was one of the “four squatters” invited and, as court records confirm, “I evicted them the following summer. (The officers) should have known he was not there”.
During the emergency dispatch audio, an officer said “the white suspect (is) down,” referring to Clint Hoyhtya.
This dispatch was soon followed by another: “The warrant said they were looking for a black man. The man down there is a white man, so we’re just trying to determine if there’s still a suspect, just to leave you. know.”
In the meantime, the BCA continues to investigate the shooting. Agency spokeswoman Bonney Bowman said, “I will likely be able to issue an update early next week.”
The shootings come two months after the fatal shooting of two Burnsville police officers and a doctor who responded after an hours-long standoff following a domestic violence call. In this case, an armed man barricaded himself inside the house with a woman and seven children. He died after turning his gun on himself.
As details of Wednesday’s shooting were still emerging, Gov. Tim Walz called it “another horrific situation” in which a Minnesota law enforcement officer was injured in the exercise of its functions.
Walz said the incident “on the horrific heels of what happened in Burnsville with the loss of our three first responders” shows “clearly” that state leaders must continue to invest money in security public so that law enforcement can “continue to do what they need to do to prevent this.”
Star Tribune writers Abby Simons, Andy Mannix and Briana Bierschbach contributed to this report.
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