Police investigate third homicide in 6 hours after man found shot in KC apartment
Kansas City recorded its third homicide within six hours Sunday morning.
Officers were dispatched to a shooting just before 10 a.m. to an apartment building at Gillham Road and Armour Boulevard, Capt. Dave Jackson, a spokesman for the Kansas City Police Department, told reporters.
There, police found a man inside the building who had been shot. The victim was declared dead at the scene, Jackson said.
The victim has not yet been publicly identified. Jackson said no suspect information was immediately available.
Just a few hours earlier, officers had been called to two other homicides, the first near the Power & Light District downtown, and the second at an apartment near the Charles B. Wheeler Downtown Airport.
“No one should have to feel this level of pain and grief over the senseless murder of a loved one,” Jackson County Sheriff Darryl Forté posted on Twitter from the first homicide scene.
Forté said he spoke to family of the victim at the scene, and urged the community to find solutions to the violence.
“This is just tragic, nonsense, crazy, I don’t know the right word, but we have got to stop solving our conflicts with guns, weapons and violence,” Jackson said at the third homicide scene Sunday.
Jackson said the department doesn’t have reason at this point to believe any of Sunday’s three homicides were related.
But, he said, the number of homicides in such a short period of time takes a toll on the detectives and those responding to the scenes. He noted no traffic officers were stationed at the busy intersection near the apartment building because they had no more available.
“When there’s three within six hours, there’s not more people coming from some other agency,” he said. “When we lose personnel, it takes a toll on the city.”
Sunday’s third killing marked the 23rd homicide in Kansas City this year. Kansas City ended last year with 182 homicides, the most in the city’s history in a single year, according to data maintained by The Star.
Police asked anyone with information about the killing to call the department’s homicide unit at 816-234-5043. Anyone who wants to remain anonymous can call the TIPS Hotline at 816-474-TIPS (8477).
An award of up to $25,000 is available for information leading to an arrest in any homicide investigation, police said.
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.
