Two people were killed and another was injured in three separate shootings in Los Angeles, ending in a car chase and standoff that resulted in the death of the suspected shooter, authorities said Tuesday.
The suspect was killed by police at about 5:30 a.m. PST after an hours-long standoff following a pursuit on State Route 91 in Anaheim, about 25 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles, according to authorities, NBC Los Angeles reported.
Authorities said no officers were injured and a weapon was recovered at the scene.
The overnight shootings happened within minutes of each other, police said.
The first one occurred about 1:15 a.m. at the intersection of Exposition Boulevard and Figueroa Street in downtown Los Angeles. One person suffered minor injuries, police said.
A second shooting occurred a few blocks away from the first shortly after 1:15 a.m., police said. A driver waiting in line at a Starbucks drive-thru was shot by the suspected gunman and died at the scene.
The third incident happened just after 1:20 a.m. near the intersection of Figueroa and 7th streets where a shooter pulled alongside a Cadillac Escalade and fired several rounds into the vehicle, according to LAPD. The passenger in the SUV died at the scene, police said.
The names of the suspect and victims have not been released by authorities. A motive for the shootings wasn't immediately clear.
Authorities said they believe the suspect was connected to all three shootings.
The triple shootings are the latest in a wave of gun violence across the country in the past year.
Data from the Gun Violence Archive, a nonpartisan research group based in Washington,D.C., showed that the number of multiple-victim shootings first spiked in April 2020 and has remained high since.
Between Jan. 1 to April 26, there have been 160 shootings in which four or more people were injured or killed — compared to just over 90 during the same period in 2020. And this year’s total is nearly double the average for the same time period every year since 2014.
While there is no federal definition for mass shootings, Gun Violence Archive defines it as a shooting incident in which four or more people are injured or killed, excluding the shooter.
Among this year's mass shootings is the April 15 attack at an Indianapolis FedEx facility where authorities said a gunman fatally shot eight people before killing himself.
