What we know about the Annunciation shooter

Here’s what’s known about Robin Westman, who killed two children and wounded 18 others in an attack on Annunciation Catholic Church Wednesday before dying of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Westman was 23, one of three children of Mary Grace Westman and James Allen Westman, who divorced after 25 years of marriage in 2013, according to court records. At the time of the divorce, the family lived in Hastings.

Westman attended Annunciation Catholic School and graduated from eighth grade in 2017.

Westman’s mother worked at Annunciation Church as a parish secretary, according to a Facebook posting in 2021, in which church officials thanked her for her “wonderful hospitality.” Mary Westman was crying when she answered her telephone Wednesday, telling a Minnesota Star Tribune reporter that she did not know if her child was the shooter before hanging up.

In the 2017 Annunciation yearbook, Westman quoted the French band Daft Punk when giving advice to younger students: “Work it. Make it. Do it. Makes us. Harder. Better. Faster. Stronger.”

Westman spent the next few years jumping from school to school.

A yearbook entry at Annunciation indicates Westman planned to go to high school at Powell Leadership Academy in Minneapolis, one of several schools operated by Minnesota Transitions Charter School. It isn’t clear if Westman attended the school. An official with Minnesota Transitions Charter School confirmed that Westman attended one of its schools for three months, leaving in October 2017.

“It just didn’t work out,” said a Minnesota Transitions administrator, who asked not to be identified. “That happens with a lot of kids who come here. There were no behavior things that we know about.”

Westman moved to St. Thomas Academy, a Catholic all-boys school in Mendota Heights where students are called cadets, dress in uniforms and are trained in military leadership. Westman left the school after finishing freshman year in June 2018.

“Our records also indicate there were no discipline or behavioral issues” and Westman was in good academic standing, said St. Thomas Academy spokesperson Amy Nugent.

While at St. Thomas, Westman wrote an ode to death titled “But Not The End” in which Westman worried about coming to the end of life with “regrets that my name not be known for something more.”

Westman’s name was legally changed to Robin M. Westman in 2020. Court records show Westman’s mother sought the change because her child “identifies as a female and wants her name to reflect that identification.”

Westman’s two-volume manifesto, published on YouTube at roughly the same time as the shootings, is mostly written in Cyrillic characters. Westman whispered pronouncements of impending doom as hands turned the pages of the handwritten text. It featured an obsession with death and repeatedly mentions an affinity with other school shooters, something Westman said began in the seventh grade.

Westman acknowledged that family members would be “disgraced” by the shootings.

Westman repeatedly referenced the pending attack by noting recent scouting missions to the church and quitting her job.

A spokesperson for Green Thumb Industries, the parent company of Rise medical cannabis dispensaries, confirmed that Westman was an employee for a few months earlier this year but was no longer with the firm at the time of the shootings. The company said it is cooperating with the investigation.

“We are deeply saddened by the tragic events that occurred today in Minnesota,” a Green Thumb spokesman said in a statement. “Our deepest condolences go out to the victims, their families and the entire community impacted by this senseless act of violence.”

The co-worker, who asked not to be identified because he did not get permission from the company to speak to the media, said Westman worked as a personal care specialist who interacted with patients enrolled in the state’s medical cannabis program.

On Wednesday, after news of the shooting broke, the Rise employee looked at Westman’s online postings beforehand. The co-worker was struck by Westman’s references to leaving a job and speculated that it could have been the catalyst for the shooting.