Prosecutors would later say that Mr. Boelter, who they said had disguised himself as a police officer and worn a mask, had gone near the homes of two additional Democratic legislators that night. At one house, they said, he went to the door but found that nobody was home. At another, they said, he left after a police officer noticed him and tried to talk to him.
Inside the federal courthouse in downtown Minneapolis on Thursday, Mr. Boelter described how the attacks played out as he responded to a series of questions from one of his lawyers.
Yes, he said, he had planned the attack for months.
Yes, he said, he had conducted research on Ms. Hortman and Mr. Hoffman.
Yes, he said, he wore a mask and disguised himself as a police officer.
Mr. Boelter, wearing an orange sweatshirt and pants with his legs shackled, spoke in even tones and answered extensive questions from Judge John R. Tunheim, who accepted the guilty pleas and the plea agreement. Mr. Boelter, who was led in and out of court by federal agents, interacted only with his lawyers and did not appear to look at the gallery, which was filled with journalists and people connected to the victims’ families.
The two surviving shooting victims, John and Yvette Hoffman, were among those in the courtroom.
“There is no justice for Mark and Melissa Hortman, and there is not justice when our family and our state will never truly heal,” the Hoffman family said in a statement after the hearing. “While the legal process may provide accountability, true healing requires something more from all of us.”