Search Warrants Reveal New Details About Cloquet Hotel Shooting Suspect

CLOQUET, Minn. – Search warrant documents reveal new details about the suspect accused of fatally shooting two people at a hotel in Cloquet before turning the gun on himself.

Cloquet police were dispatched at 6:33 p.m. Jan. 8 to the Super 8 hotel for a report of an “attack.”

The search warrants say the suspect, Nicholas Lenius, 32, of Ramsey, Minnesota, was on the phone with his supervisor just three minutes before the 911 dispatch.

The supervisor told police he called Lenius at 6:30 p.m. after receiving a Snapchat message from him that said “WTF is going on,” according to the warrants.

Police say surveillance video appears to show Lenius talking to someone on the phone during the incident.

Police say Lenius fatally shot 22-year-old hotel clerk Shellby Trettel of Cloquet and then shot and killed 35-year-old Patrick Roers of Deer River in a vehicle in the Super 8 parking lot.

The suspect was found dead outside the hotel with an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to police.

A motive for the crime remains under investigation.