On November 15, 1989, 13-year-old Basee Lor, a Hmong boy, was killed on a raspberry farm in Inver Grove Heights, Minnesota, after a police pursuit of a stolen Mazda ended with three Asian teenage boys abandoning the car and running on foot. Officer Kenneth E. Murphy had positioned himself near the farm and radioed that he had eyes on two of the boys; forty-eight seconds later he fired a single blast from his shotgun. Basee was struck by two pellets in his back, one lodging in his abdomen, and another pellet grazed his arm.

A second boy, 13-year-old Thai Yang, was also struck; a pellet to his upper left shoulder severed part of his heart. Officer Murphy later said he had mistaken a screwdriver the boys carried for a gun; no firearm was found, and a stainless-steel‑bladed screwdriver was recovered on the ground between them. Murphy was not criminally charged.

Many in the St. Paul Hmong community protested and demanded investigation after the deaths, and the case left lasting grief and mistrust. If anyone knew Basee, Thai, or was at the farm that afternoon, please share what was seen or remembered.