A small town's kindness toward strangers nearly cost the life of a suspected shooter near Willmar

Lisa Skluzacek said she “had just read the whole situation and I thought, 'I wonder who that is?' ” in reference to the fatally shot victim. The next day she found out that it was her former husband, with whom she has an adult son.

“He was always willing to help people and he was a pretty funny guy,” said Lisa Skluzacek, who has kept in regular contact with him since their divorce in 2010 and shared that he was engaged. “He could fix just about anything.”

Other Skluzacek family members told the Star Tribune they didn't want to talk.

News of the car theft came as a shock to residents of New London, a lakeside town of about 1,200 residents, and Lake Lillian, a community about 30 miles away with about 200 residents. A Lake Lillian resident, who did not want to be named, said she was near the scene and marveled at the randomness of the violence.

Tuesday's events occurred just before 1 p.m. when police were called to an apartment complex in the 2900 block of Lyndale Avenue S., where the man fired several shots into the street from the top floor of the building.

Police closed the busy intersection and surrounding blocks from W. 28th to Lake Street in the densely populated commercial and residential corridor as they tried to negotiate his surrender.