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Investigation documents reveal new details about South Haven shooter

Posted at 5:45 PM, Sep 23, 2021
and last updated 2021-09-23 18:47:10-04

SOUTH HAVEN, Mich. — Disturbing details from South Haven police recount the day a man opened fire on the South Haven pier.

A little more than a month ago, Aidan Ingalls shot and killed a man on the South Haven pier. Ingalls also shot the man's wife, who survived but is in rehab. Ingalls then turned the gun on himself.

South Haven police released investigation documents that tell more about what they found. Ingalls left a suicide note.

Here is a portion of what Ingalls wrote in a journal discovered by police:

“Here I am and for the first time in what feels like ages, I don’t really feel sick. I don’t feel anxious, nervous, excited, happy, sad, etc. I feel absolutely nothing but content and acceptance."

Those words, written the day Ingalls chose to go to the South Haven pier and open fire. Swastikas and white supremacy markings were found on the gun he used.

In Ingalls's bedroom, police say they found more than 30 books ranging in subject matter, from serial killers, to Charles Manson, to the Columbine shooting, religious texts, and books on Hitler.

On Aug. 20, 2021, Ingalls ended a couple's decades-long marriage with gunfire. He shot and killed Charles Skuza. Charles's wife, Barbra, is seriously injured and remains in rehab following the shooting.

A witness says the couple was holding hands, looking out at the water just before the shooting.

Dozens of witnesses spoke to the police. Most were there with their children that day.

One witness, a mother, details how she begged a man, whose jet ski had just been hit by Ingall's gunfire, to take her seven-year-old with them to safety.

Police say Ingalls may have only killed one person other than himself that day, but it wasn't for lack of trying.

One witness says Ingalls fired shots at her sailboat, but aimed too high.

Another bullet went right past a woman's head and hit the sand when she was sunbathing.

A woman and her child reported hugging the lighthouse for cover, as they watched a bullet skip past them.

Ingalls left cash behind for coworkers, two journals, and photo albums.

This all comes after Ingalls had already plotted an attack on his high school in Paw Paw in 2018.

READ MORE: Deadly South Haven pier shooter was Paw Paw student who planned 2018 school attack

He had been fully released from the justice system only weeks before the shooting.

Law enforcement in Van Buren County said they feared something like this would happen if Ingalls were ever allowed to walk free.

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