Kasota shooting story revisited

By Joe Spear
Free Press Editor

The story of a tragic shooting in Kasota last July was a bit unfinished when the Grand Jury decided against prosecuting Le Sueur County Deputy Todd Waldron for the shooting death of Tyler Heilman.

The two had been involved in a violent confrontation in Kasota that eventually lead Waldron to use his weapon to defend himself, and the Grand Jury last fall ruled his use of force was justified because his life was sufficiently threatened.

But through the many stories published by The Free Press on the incident, some information was not available. That's why when the complete investigative report become public, The Free Press felt a need to review the report, compare the facts to what was decided by the Grand Jury and provide readers more information for them to make their own decisions about the justification for the shooting.

The report was nearly 1,600 pages, and Free Press reporter Dan Nienaber spent hours going over it. What evolved was a four part series telling the story in a chronological way with more details than were previously made public anywhere.

This, we feel, would serve readers by providing them a more clear picture of what transpired that day. Sometimes, you can have one view when you hear a person was shot, but have another completely different view once you know the context of that shooting.

That's what The Free Press series was about - providing readers with context so they could more fully understand the situation.

Some readers may fault the officer more, now that they know more details. Some may find more fault with the victim and his provocations.

But, at it's core, this kind of story needs to be told. The public needs as much information as possible to gain a better understanding of events, especially because someone was killed.

We've had some readers just not want an ugly situation "brought up all over again." Some have said it's "overkill." Some have said if we can't print the "whole story" we should print nothing at all.

I respectfully disagree with all of these ideas. A man was killed. There's more information about that now. It's our obligation to report it.