photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Lawrence City Manager Craig Owens, left, and Lawrence Police Chief Rich Lockhart walk out of City Hall to brief the media on a fatal shooting at City Hall on Monday, Jan. 5, 2026.

Updated at 1:38 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 8

An unarmed Minnesota man who was fatally shot Monday by an employee at City Hall was brought to Lawrence the previous evening at his own request and had done nothing to warrant arrest or involuntary commitment by state troopers, according to the Kansas Highway Patrol.

A spokeswoman for KHP, April McCollum, told the Journal-World that 28-year-old Omar Dominguez Gavilan sought a ride Sunday from troopers from the Lawrence Service Area on the Kansas Turnpike to the Amtrak station in East Lawrence.

“Mr. Gavilan advised that he had missed his ride on a Greyhound bus while traveling through Kansas and sought transport to the Amtrak station in Lawrence,” McCollum said in an email Thursday.

She said troopers brought Gavilan to Lawrence and dropped him off at 7:31 p.m. without incident. He displayed “unusual behavior” during the encounter, she said, but she did not specify what was unusual about it. The behavior, though, “did not provide a basis for arrest or involuntary commitment to a substance abuse or mental health facility.”

Lawrence Police Department spokeswoman Laura McCabe on Wednesday told the Journal-World that LPD considered KHP a trusted partner and that the incident was not a case of authorities dropping a transient person off in Lawrence to take advantage of the city’s services for the homeless.

In a news release earlier this week, McCabe said that KHP was called to remove Gavilan, of Buffalo, Minnesota, from the Turnpike Service Area because he was acting “erratically,” though what constituted erratic behavior was not specified. McCabe did say that Gavilan’s behavior was not deemed to have warranted arrest.

It’s not clear what Gavilan did overnight Sunday after he was dropped off, but on Monday morning he apparently broke into a nonpublic area of City Hall — a little less than half a mile from the Amtrak station — and got into a physical altercation inside after a Municipal Court security officer confronted him and Gavilan reportedly refused to comply with the officer’s demands. The security officer had been alerted by concerned employees. The confrontation ended with Gavilan being fatally shot.

Employees at City Hall “certainly felt threatened, which is why they called court security for help,” McCabe said of Monday’s incident, which happened right around 8 a.m., when the building opened to the public. Gavilan and a court security officer were the ones involved in the altercation. Gavilan did not have a firearm, McCabe confirmed Thursday for the first time, and the court security officer discharged his firearm during “the attack.”

Police have said that the encounter was largely caught on security cameras, but they said no camera footage would be released pending the investigation. Many other details about the incident, including the shooter’s identity, have also been withheld pending the investigation.

McCabe said a full report was expected to be completed and sent to the Douglas County District Attorney’s Office for review — to determine whether the use of force was justified — within two to three weeks. During that time, the employee who shot Gavilan will remain on administrative leave.

McCabe said the final report would include “answers to many questions like how the suspect gained entry, precise discussions and actions of all involved, and background and training information.”

“We realize an event like this at a public building is disconcerting for our community, which is why City Manager Craig Owens and Chief (Rich) Lockhart spoke publicly about the investigation so quickly after it occurred,” McCabe said. “It is also why we later shared details about the ongoing investigation, despite not having every detail thoroughly investigated. It’s a sad and tragic event.”

A woman from Minnesota identifying herself as Gavilan’s mother wrote on social media Tuesday in Spanish: “Thank you for the gift of being your mother I love you to infinity and beyond you will always be my baby.”

She also wrote, “It’s not fair what happened.”

The City Commission meeting room at City Hall was open Tuesday evening for commissioners’ regular meeting. Aside from that, the building had been closed since Monday but reopened on Thursday.

“City Hall is welcoming the public today,” city spokeswoman Cori Wallace said. “It is safe, and in-person services have resumed.”