Police investigate shooting that killed person in Kansas City neighborhood
Police were investigating a homicide after an early morning shooting in a Kansas City neighborhood, a Kansas City police dispatcher said.
Officers responded to reports of gunfire shortly after 6 a.m. in the 2900 block of East 30th Street, near Walrond Avenue.
Officer Donna Drake, a spokeswoman with the Kansas City Police Department, later said responding officers were directed by people at the scene to a man who was unresponsive inside the house.
The man, who had been shot, was pronounced dead at the scene.
He was later identified as Frank Richardson, 26.
Drake said a second victim showed up at the hospital with life-threatening injuries. Police don’t yet know if the two victims are part of the same incident.
No suspect information was immediately available.
Sharita Hargrove, who lives down the street from the taped-off homicide scene, has been a resident of the neighborhood for more than 25 years.
“It’s sad that we even have to live like this,” she said as she sat on her porch Monday morning. “We can’t enjoy our own communities.”
Hargrove said she wishes there was more of a police presence on 30th Street, where people often speed and burglaries can be common. She said in recent years, she hasn’t noticed officers in the area as often as she used to.
“Police aren’t vigilant in our neighborhood anymore,” she said.
The killing is Kansas City’s 152nd homicide of the year, according to data kept by The Star, which includes police shootings. That compares to 120 homicides reported by this time in 2019.
Across the entire Kansas City metro area, there have been 216 homicides reported this year.
Anyone with information about the killing is asked to call the TIPS Hotline at 816-474-TIPS (8477).
Gun violence will be the subject of a new, statewide journalism project The Star is undertaking in Missouri this year in partnership with the national service program Report for America and sponsored in part by Missouri Foundation for Health. As part of this project, The Star will seek the community’s help.
To contribute, visit Report for America online at reportforamerica.org.
This story was originally published October 12, 2020 at 8:25 AM.
