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21-year-old kills his sister as he fires hundreds of shots in Minnesota home, cops say

A 21-year-old is accused of killing his sister as he fired hundreds of bullets inside his family’s Minnesota home last weekend, officials say.

Joseph Thomas Ness was charged with second-degree murder Tuesday in the death of his 25-year-old sister, Noelle, at the home in Chanhassen, a Minneapolis suburb, officials say.

On Saturday afternoon, their mother rushed to a nearby home and asked her neighbor to call the police after the shooting.

“Joey shot and killed Noelle,” the distraught mother told her neighbor, according to a criminal complaint.

When a deputy arrived at the neighbor’s home, the criminal complaint says she repeated that her son shot her daughter and he had “multiple weapons.” She didn’t know whether her son was still in the house.

Then another neighbor called 911. She said Ness walked onto her property from a public trail and shared an admission that startled her, the complaint says.

“Please help me. I need your help. I need you to call the police for me,” she recalled him saying, according to the complaint. “I just killed my sister. I want to surrender peacefully. I am unarmed.”

Deputies arrested Ness at the neighbor’s home.

Inside the Ness family’s home, deputies say, they found hundreds of rifle casings, bullets holes in the walls, and shattered windows from gunfire.

Ness had apparently fired from his bedroom into his sister’s bedroom across the hall, the complaint says.

Inside his sister’s bedroom, it appeared Noelle was shot “at a closer range,” and a dozen rifle casings were found near her bed, the complaint says.

Investigators seized six rifles, including AR-15 and AK-47 variants, ammunition and high-capacity drum magazines, officials say.

The criminal complaint does not include a motive for the shooting. The second-degree murder charge is described as intentional but not premeditated.

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