All right, I’ll confess my unpopular opinion right up front here. If you find yourself in the middle of a high-profile police investigation, getting an attorney right up front is the smart choice. In fact, every concealed-carry course I’ve ever taken emphasizes the need to wait for your attorney before speaking to police even after an obviously justified self-defense shooting, just because.
That said, however, it would be odd for witnesses to feel the need to lawyer up, especially those not present at the scene of the crime. And yet, that’s exactly what the mother of the man who sprayed Annunciation Catholic Church with over 100 rounds and killed two children has done:
The mother of transgender Minneapolis mass shooter Robin Westman is not cooperating with police in the investigation — and has hired a criminal defense attorney in the wake of the deadly shooting killed two young children and injured 18 others.
Mary Grace Westman, who worked at Annunciation Catholic School, which was targeted by the deranged 23-year-old gunman Wednesday morning, has not contacted police — nor responded to their attempts to reach her, Minneapolis police announced at a press conference Thursday.
“We have not been successful in talking to the shooter’s mother,” Police Chief Brian O’Hara said.
Not only did Westman refuse to cooperate with police, she apparently tried to ghost them. The FBI showed up at her second residence in East Naples, Florida, looking to talk with her about the mass shooting. They didn’t find her there either, apparently, but local news station WINK got tipped to their effort:
It seems very strange that the FBI had to go to Florida to find Westman. It’s one thing to hire an attorney to work with law enforcement in this situation, but another thing entirely to disappear on law enforcement.
Her attorney dutifully released a statement declaring that Westman had “no culpability” in the shooting, which may well be true in a legal sense. But if that’s the case, why play hide-and-seek with the FBI? All she needs to do is tell them that she will not answer questions without her attorney present, and that would be the end of those contacts. Going on the lam to avoid her location being discovered by law enforcement looks strange, and more than just a tad suspicious — as if she believes they may have reason to detain or arrest her.
It certainly didn’t stop police and FBI agents from executing search warrants on her residences:
Despite coming up empty in their Florida search for Westman, police executed four search warrants on Wednesday and retrieved hundreds of pieces of evidence, including electronic devices. … Her whereabouts currently remain unclear, as authorities revealed that she is not cooperating with police in the investigation.
Again, hiring a lawyer is understandable under the circumstances. Westman just lost her son, after all, not to mention how her son murdered two children and nearly killed many more before committing suicide, and she clearly needs help navigating her next steps. But why refuse to cooperate with police, if she had “no culpability,” as her attorney claims? Westman can’t protect her son any longer, and even if she hired an attorney, she could still work with police through him to help close out the investigation as quickly as possible.
And even more to the point, why disappear from law enforcement in the middle of a mass-murder investigation? Disappearing from the media and from neighbors may also be understandable, but ghosting investigators while other parents bury their children and still more try to help their children heal physically and emotionally is either an act of supreme narcissism or evidence of a guilty conscience. Perhaps that’s more in the realm of moral guilt, but at this critical time in the investigation, it certainly looks more like Westman has some consciousness of legal culpability.
Perhaps her attorney will clarify this further today. He certainly needs to do so … assuming he can find his own client.
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