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Elizabeth Baier
St. Paul, Minn.

Police: Rochester father kills 9-year-old daughter, self

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Updated: 11 a.m. | Posted: 6 a.m.

Rochester police say their preliminary investigation shows a father killed his 9-year-old daughter during a weekend visit before turning the gun on himself.

Both bodies were found Sunday afternoon in the basement of a house on the city's northwest side where the 49-year-old father lived. Relatives living upstairs called police after hearing noise from the basement, police said.

"They heard some loud noises. But it wasn't unusual for loud noises to come from the basement area, so they didn't immediately recognize the loud noises as gunshots," Rochester Police Lt. Casey Moilanen said. It was the first murder in Rochester in 2014.

The girl spent time between that address and her mother's house, which is also in Rochester, according to Moilanen.

The medical examiner will conduct an autopsy on the bodies today. Officials expect to release both names on Tuesday, pending notification of relatives.

The man's brother, his significant other, and their three children were in the house at the time of the shooting, Moilanen said.

The girl's mother had arrived at the house to pick up her daughter and was also there at the time of the shooting.

Moilanen said the family is "saddened, shocked, that a child was lost, a brother was lost, a father was lost."