FBI, ATF supporting Minnesota crackdown on Somali gang violence

I'm Randy Meyer. And I'm Kelsey Carlson. We begin with our top story tonight, a new crime fighting framework metro-wide. Dozens of law enforcement agencies will now meet weekly about gang violence across the state. Fox 9's Emily Pofall is live at the Minnesota Department of Public Safety Emergency Operations Center. And Emily, big announcement there concerning crime fighting cooperation. Yep, more than 40 law enforcement agencies, dozens of analysts and a new way of sharing vital information. If the sheer size of this operation doesn't get the message across Bloomington Chief Booker Hodges might doing this look up here you got an option you can deal with this or you can stop doing what you're doing dozens of local departments the state BCA alongside the FBI and the Federal Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and firearms the announcement Monday a new framework for sharing critical information in gang cases like in this Bloomington neighborhood shooting much of the gang violence in the metro now involves Somali youth. It's a new and emergent issue in terms of how decentralized it is and impacting so many communities across the Twin Cities. 46 agencies will share information and meet weekly under the Crime Gun Intelligence Center. The group isn't using a singular database to track gang members, but 56 analysts are tracking digital and gun evidence from gang crimes. Locally, Sheriff DeJuanna Witt is starting a new Hennepin Enhanced enforcement team and federally the ATF has redirected a task force to tackle the issue as the area's top cops took turns at the mic each condemned a recent rash of incendiary rhetoric against the Somali community earlier this month president Trump in a post online told his nearly 13 million followers to fight back against Somalis in Minnesota with all the hatred that we've been seeing coming through social media channels blaming our entire community for the actions of some is absolutely ridiculous, unneeded, unnecessary. Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher, with a long-running gang task force of his own, backs the new collaboration. In the reality of our job, that information sharing is what gets us to help get convictions and charge people. So, great police work. So think of it this way, rather than one big statewide gang task force, This is multiple local and county level task forces that now have a new uniform way of sharing information. The BCA superintendent here today did not rule out a statewide gang task force if this issue persists. In Blaine, Emily Pofall, Fox 9. All right. Thank you, Emily.