KC’s homicide pace up 50 percent from last year after three killings Friday night

Kansas City police are investigating three shooting deaths that occurred within four hours Friday night, bringing the city’s steadily rising homicide count to 84 in 2017 — a 50 percent increase over the same period last year.

Police said officers were sent to the 2500 block of Van Brunt Boulevard just after 10 p.m. on a report of a shooting. Officers found a man with an apparent gunshot wound on the front porch of a residence.

The Kansas City Fire Department, which also responded, declared the victim dead at the scene.

Two hours earlier, a man called police to report that his son had been shot at a residence in the 3800 block of East Sixth Street, just south of Independence Avenue in the Northeast area. Officers found the victim with life-threatening injuries. He was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Witnesses told police the victim was in the front yard around 8:15 p.m. when an unknown person shot him. The motive for the shooting was not known, police said.

Police described the suspect as a slim man in his 20s, about 5-foot-2, wearing a white tank top and a white T-shirt over his face. He was last seen on foot headed east on East Sixth Street, police said.

Another man was fatally shot shortly before 6:30 p.m. inside a vehicle at Avenue Car Wash in the 5700 block of Independence Avenue. Police have not released a motive for the shooting or suspect information.

That shooting occurred a little more than a mile east of the shooting on Sixth Street.

Police ask anyone with information on any of the homicides to call the TIPS Hotline at 816-474-TIPS (8477).

The city’s homicide count for this date last year was 56.

This story was originally published July 22, 2017 at 7:26 AM with the headline "KC’s homicide pace up 50 percent from last year after three killings Friday night."