In the cold of a late January evening in 2018, the life of 20-year-old TyNeisha Pate, a Black/African American woman, was cut short by gunfire in north Minneapolis. On Tuesday, January 30th, shots rang out around 9:45 p.m. in the 1800 block of Lyndale Avenue N. Though police initially found nothing at the scene of the shooting, a grim discovery was made soon after. Pate's body was found on the side of the road in the 2200 block of the same avenue.
Despite the efforts of a friend and others who pulled her from a vehicle to perform CPR, her injuries were fatal.
In the immediate aftermath, while authorities had not officially released her name, her mother, Shell Pate, identified her daughter through a heart-wrenching social media post. Friends remembered TyNeisha Pate as a woman dedicated to her family, particularly her young daughter, and not involved in gangs or drugs. The senseless violence that took her life left her family grappling with an immense and sudden loss. A GoFundMe page was created to help with the unexpected funeral expenses for the young mother.
As days turned into months, the investigation into TyNeisha Pate's death struggled to gain traction. By July of that year, her case remained unsolved, with no arrests made and no new leads for detectives to follow. Frustrated by the lack of progress and communication from the police, Pate's mother took it upon herself to seek answers, reaching out to potential witnesses and trying to piece together the events of that tragic night. The police, citing the need to protect the integrity of the ongoing investigation, remained tight-lipped about any potential suspects or the specific circumstances that led to the shooting. This left a grieving family in a painful state of limbo, searching for justice for a life taken too soon.
