The man accused of opening fire on Tuesday inside a Minnesota medical clinic faces several charges, including murder, after the mass shooting – which police records show he had previously threatened against the clinic’s staff.
Gregory Paul Ulrich, 67, is accused of shooting five people at the Allina Health Clinic in Buffalo, killing one and injuring four, as well as detonating two bombs. The authorities said Ulrich went into deadly fury because he was “unhappy” with the treatment he received at the clinic.
He was charged on Thursday with one second-degree murder charge, four counts of premeditated attempted murder, one charge of detonating an explosive device and one charge of unlicensed pistol possession, according to court records.
The dead victim was identified by her loved ones and local media as Lindsay Overbay, a medical assistant at the clinic. Overbay was a mother of two, 37 years old, according to a GoFundMe created to help her family.
“She was the bright light in so many people’s lives, she could light up a room with her infectious laugh,” says GoFundMe. “Lindsay was taking classes in college to further her career and make sure she could provide a better life for her two beautiful children.”
Her husband, Donnie Overbay, told the Star Tribune that his wife had recently certified as a nursing assistant and signed up for a program to learn how to do ultrasound because she had a strong interest in internal organs.
Donnie Overbay said he told his children, aged 5 and 8, that his mother was gone, but he did not explain how she died and did not believe that they would understand that they would not see her again.
“When it comes to a few weeks, I have to say to them, ‘She’s in heaven looking after you,'” he said.
Lindsay Overbay’s best friend for nearly 20 years, Naiya Stubbe, said they hadn’t seen each other for months because of the pandemic, but kept in touch with daily Snapchats and, occasionally, hour-long video chats.
“Her laugh was the best sound,” said Stubbe. “It was hard not to fall in love with her right away.”
This was not the sniper’s first confrontation with the police – or with the medical clinic and its staff, show the police records obtained by BuzzFeed News.
In October 2018, a doctor at the clinic allegedly filed a restraining order against Ulrich after he received several harassing calls in which Ulrich threatened to commit mass shooting at the hospital, allegedly saying “he wanted it to be big and sensational so that make an impact. “
Ulrich denied any real intentions by the police, saying he was just describing a dream he had about “revenge on the people who ‘tortured’ him.” He was angry about the back surgery he had done at the clinic and what the police described as “drug problems after surgery”.
A month later, Ulrich was arrested for returning to the clinic. But according to the Star Tribune, the charges were dropped after he was found to be mentally incapable due to psychological problems and substance abuse.
Ulrich returned to the clinic several times after that, scaring the team. A police report shows that Ulrich also called the nurse’s line, “demanding that he be supplied with narcotics.”
At a news conference on Thursday, Wright County Sheriff Sean Deringer acknowledged Ulrich’s widely publicized criminal record and defended police actions.
Deringer said that although the police were aware of Ulrich’s many threats against the clinic, there was “nothing recent in the past few months or even a year that we knew of where we would have taken immediate steps to try to get around or prevent what happened Tuesday morning. “
“If we are going to blame it, I would like to blame it on Mr. Ulrich, whose responsible for the devastation that has happened in our Buffalo community,” said Deringer.