Triple shooting leaves one dead Triple shooting leaves one dead (January 16, 2002)

Police say incident was drug-related

by Daniel Moreau

Police in East Palo Alto say drugs played a role in a triple shooting at a house on Weeks Street, which left one man dead and two others hospitalized.

Police arriving at the home shortly after noon Friday and found one Hispanic man with head wounds sitting inside a parked car at the intersection of Paul Robeson Court and Weeks Street, the engine still running. He later was pronounced dead at 12:30 p.m.

Inside the house, in one of the rear bedrooms, police uncovered another shooting victim, a Hispanic man wounded in the chest. A suitcase full of marijuana was also found in that room.

In the home's back yard, a third man, who also had a gunshot to the chest, was found.

Both chest wound victims are currently in the hospital, one in critical, the other in stable condition. The identity of all three men remains undisclosed by police.

Police said a young woman was handcuffed and taken away from the scene in a squad car, shortly before 2 p.m. Her possible involvement in the case has not yet been determined.

No ostensible motive for the shootings has been made public as of yet. This is the second drug-related shooting, and the third shooting incident overall, to have occurred in the past two weeks in East Palo Alto, bringing the number of recent gunshot victims in the city up to four. Police say that all three crimes are unconnected.

Given the recent string of shootings (11 incidents in four months), Police Chief Wes Bowling recently convened a "violence suppression summit" with officers and agents from the precincts of San Mateo County, Redwood City and Mountain View. The California Department of Justice of the San Jose office, the Probation Department and the California Youth Authority also attended.

They discussed possible explanations for the recent rise in crime: among others, an escalating gang war. Despite recent arrests made by East Palo Alto police, a comprehensive program to stem further violence is under way.

Anyone with information regarding Friday's or previous shootings are asked to contact Detective McTaggart at (650) 599-7419 or Detective Frey at (650) 599-7426. Or, leave a message on the San Mateo Sheriff's anonymous witness line at 1-(800)-547-2700.