Daniel J. Mack Jr., a 26-year-old resident of Brooklyn Park, was fatally shot in the head on June 4, 2020, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. His body was discovered in a vehicle outside North Memorial Health Hospital in Robbinsdale shortly after 9 p.m. that evening. The Hennepin County Medical Examiner's Office confirmed that Mack had been shot in the head. Minneapolis police believe the shooting occurred in the 3300 block of N. Colfax Avenue, where there were reports of gunfire.
It is unclear whether Mack drove himself to the hospital or was driven there by someone else.
Three men were initially charged in connection with Mack's death: Donell Deon Flowers, Edward Lee, and Tylan Deaontae Bland. These individuals were indicted on first-degree murder charges by a grand jury. According to the charges, Mack and the driver of the Jeep he was in were members of the Low End gang. They were driving through the intersection of N. 34th and Dupont avenues, a territory controlled by the rival Tre Tre Crips. Witnesses reported seeing the Jeep circle the block multiple times before a verbal altercation ensued between the Jeep's occupants and men outside an SUV. This confrontation escalated into a barrage of gunfire, with all four men outside the SUV firing at the Jeep as it drove away. Police recovered over 50 spent shell casings of various calibers from the scene.
Despite the initial charges, the case against Flowers, Lee, and Bland fell apart when a key witness recanted his testimony. This witness had initially told detectives that he had seen the three men with guns before the shooting. However, he later claimed that he had not been home at the time of the incident and that his original statement had been coerced by a police investigator. As a result, Hennepin County prosecutors dismissed the first-degree murder charges against all three men, citing the inability to secure the necessary witnesses to prove the charges beyond a reasonable doubt.
