Shooting stemming from ‘fender bender’ now a triple homicide after third victim dies
The third victim of a triple shooting earlier this month has died from his injuries, police said.
Gregory Harper, 41, was shot on March 6, along with Joseph Smith, 64, and Curtis Thompkins, 33. Smith and Thompkins were declared dead at the scene, said Officer Donne Drake, a spokeswoman with the Kansas City Police Department.
Officers were called at 8:40 p.m. March 6 to an outdoor disturbance in the 5000 block of Agnes Avenue, police said at the time. The call was later upgraded to a shooting.
Police at the scene found Smith and Thompkins unresponsive with apparent gunshot wounds in front of a home just north of East 51st Street and Agnes Avenue. The third man, Harper, who had also been shot, was found just north of the homicide victims, police said. He was taken to the hospital in critical condition.
At the time of the shooting, Kennia Barnes had been watching a movie with her three young children at their home on Agnes Avenue when they heard a noise down the street.
It was a loud rattling, like a busted tire, accompanied by a volley of gunshots, she told The Star in the days after the shooting.
“It started getting closer so we just hit the ground,” Barnes, 38, said. “I told them to get down. Stay down for awhile.”
About three minutes later she heard someone coughing outside her open window. Barnes watched as a man walked up her front porch stairs.
“I’ve been shot,” he said. “Can you help me?”
He laid down on the porch and she got a towel to press against the gunshot wound on his side. He didn’t say much in the couple minutes that lapsed before an ambulance arrived to take him to the hospital.
Police said the shooting seemed to stem from a fender bender crash, which caused a “large disturbance” that led to gunfire, Sgt. Jake Becchina with the police department previously said.
Harper’s killing marks the 33rd 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 are asking anyone with information on the shooting to contact homicide detectives at 816-234-5043 or the TIPS Hotline at 816-474-TIPS (8477). There is a reward of up to $25,000 for information in the killing.
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.
