Gov. Tim Walz has spoken before of a shooting last year at a recreation center in St. Paul, Minn., that he said had an impact on his teenage son, Gus. But in the vice-presidential debate with Senator JD Vance of Ohio on Tuesday night, Mr. Walz went further in saying that his son witnessed the shooting, which left one teenager seriously wounded.
On Wednesday, a volleyball coach who played a central role in the response that day described what he, Gus and others experienced in the frightening moments after they had heard gunfire outside.
The coach, David Albornoz, said he ran to investigate, while Gus, a team captain and an assistant coach on a boys’ volleyball team, helped guide young people in the gym to a safe location when many thought a mass shooting was occurring.
“We heard the gunshots,” Mr. Albornoz said. “You hear the screaming. I had no more information than what I gathered.”
The shooting, which was propelled into the national spotlight when Mr. Walz and Mr. Vance discussed how they would address gun violence in the country, was widely reported in St. Paul at the time. It took place in January 2023 outside the Jimmy Lee Recreation Center, part of the Oxford Community Center, one of the largest and busiest facilities in the city’s parks and recreation system. It is also across the street from Central High School, where Gus is a student.
According to several court documents, the 16-year-old victim, JuVaughn Turner, and some of his friends were outside when a young woman got into a dispute with an employee at the recreation center, Exavir Binford.
JuVaughn, taking the woman’s side in the dispute, got into a physical altercation with Mr. Binford that involved two other people. Mr. Binford then shot JuVaughn in the forehead with a pistol, court records show.
Mr. Binford, who was originally charged with attempted murder and first-degree assault, pleaded guilty to the assault charge and was sentenced to more than 10 years in prison in February.
JuVaughn was left permanently injured from the shooting and still has fragments of the bullet in the frontal lobe of his brain, said Andrew L. Marshall, who is representing JuVaughn’s mother, Margarita Davison, in a lawsuit against Mr. Binford and the City of St. Paul. City officials declined to comment about details of the incident.
Mr. Albornoz said that he, Gus and the other volleyball players did not see the shooting but were forced to react to the sound of the gunshots, not knowing what was happening but fearing the worst. He said he quickly turned to Gus, who helped lead the volleyball practice, and told him to take the young players to safety in his office, which could be locked. Mr. Albornoz went outside to help.
There, he found JuVaughn. He knelt beside him, he said, holding his head up with both of his hands to prevent JuVaughn from losing more blood. He also spoke with JuVaughn while they waited for emergency medical workers to arrive.
“I had a really hard time after the shooting dealing with PTSD symptoms,” Mr. Albornoz said. “I don’t think I’m totally over it. I had a hard time last night with the memories coming back.”
At a recent rally in Grand Rapids, Mich., Mr. Walz said that Gus was at the location of a shooting and was affected by it. In an interview with Minnesota Public Radio in March, the governor said his son was still getting over it.
Asked for additional comment on Wednesday, Mr. Walz’s campaign pointed to earlier reports of the governor’s appearances.
In St. Paul, the community center was closed for a month after the shooting to “give the staff some time to reset” after the traumatic event, said Andy Rodriguez, the director of St. Paul Parks and Recreation.
“As the governor said last night, that stuff sticks with you,” he said.
Mr. Marshall, the lawyer for Ms. Davison, said in a statement that she was conflicted about seeing her son’s shooting discussed in the debate.
“On the one hand, she is once again faced with a public reminder of the devastating event that forever altered not only her son’s life, but the lives of all of JuVaughn’s family members,” he said. “On the other hand, she believes that there needs to be more attention — and action to address the epidemic of public shootings.”
Like many cities across the country, St. Paul, a city with more than 300,000 residents, has largely seen a decline in violent crime over time since the pandemic, though the rates remain higher than before the pandemic. This year, the violent crime rates in St. Paul and nearby Minneapolis are on a pace to finish the year slightly higher than in 2023.
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