These photographs taken from surveillance video and offered by the New York Police Division present a person suspected of capturing two homeless individuals on Saturday, March 12, 2022 in New York. (New York Police Division through AP)
NEW YORK --
A search was underway Monday for a gunman who has been stalking homeless males sleeping on the streets of Washington, D.C., and New York Metropolis, fatally capturing two individuals and wounding three extra in lower than two weeks.
Police launched surveillance images of the suspected gunman late Sunday, together with one through which the hooded man will be seen holding a pistol in a blue glove.
The killer's motive -- if any -- was unknown and authorities turned their consideration Monday to attempting to supply what protections they might to homeless individuals who would possibly grow to be targets.
New York Mayor Eric Adams mentioned cops and homeless outreach groups would give attention to discovering unhoused individuals within the subways and different places and would urge them to hunt refuge at city-owned shelters.
"The case is a transparent and horrific intentional act of taking the life of somebody, it seems, as a result of he was homeless," Adams mentioned at a information convention late Sunday. "Two people have been shot whereas sleeping on the streets, not committing against the law however sleeping on the streets."
The earliest identified capturing occurred at round 4 a.m. on March 3 in Washington D.C., police mentioned, when a person was shot and wounded within the metropolis's Northeast part. A second man was wounded on March 8, simply earlier than 1:30 a.m.
At 3 a.m. the subsequent day, March 9, police and firefighters discovered a lifeless man inside a burning tent. A subsequent post-mortem revealed that the person had died of a number of stab and gunshot wounds.
The killer then apparently traveled north to New York Metropolis, police mentioned.
At 4:30 a.m. Saturday, a 38-year-old man sleeping on the road in Manhattan not removed from the doorway to the Holland Tunnel was shot in his proper arm as he slept.
The sufferer screamed and the gunman fled, police mentioned.
About 90 minutes later, the gunman fatally shot one other man on Lafayette Avenue in SoHo, police mentioned. The person's physique was present in his sleeping bag simply earlier than 5 p.m. Saturday.
Police decided the identical particular person dedicated the assaults primarily based on the similarities of every capturing and proof recovered from the scenes. The victims have been attacked with out provocation, police mentioned.
"We're dedicated to sharing each investigative path, clue and piece of proof with our regulation enforcement companions to carry this investigation to a swift conclusion and the person behind these vicious crimes to justice," Metropolitan Police Chief Robert Contee mentioned in a information launch.
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is helping within the investigation.
The assaults have been paying homage to the beating deaths of 4 homeless males as they slept on the streets in New York's Chinatown within the fall of 2019. One other homeless man, Randy Santos, has pleaded not responsible to homicide costs in these assaults.
A 12 months in the past, 4 individuals have been stabbed in New York Metropolis, two fatally, by a person who randomly attacked homeless individuals within the subway system. That assailant, who was additionally homeless, is awaiting trial.
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