KENOSHA, Wis (AP) – Authorities say they have arrested a person in connection with a shooting at a busy tavern in southeast Wisconsin, which killed three men and injured three men.
Kenosha County Sheriff’s Department Spokesman Sgt. David Wright said the suspect is facing a charge of premeditated first-degree murder, with additional criminal charges likely after further investigation. Authorities said earlier they were not sure if there was more than one shooter.
“There is currently no threat to the community,” Wright said in a release. He said no further information about the suspect would be released on Sunday.
Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth had earlier said a suspect was asked to leave the Somers House Tavern in Kenosha County but returned and opened fire. Beth said shots were fired inside and outside the bar, which he described at the time as “very busy”. He said he believed at least one gun was used.
Kenosha is about 50 miles south of Milwaukee, not far from the Wisconsin-Illinois border.
Officials originally said two people were injured, but said they were going to hospitals to look for people who may have been injured during the shooting. Wright said in the updated release that authorities believe there is a ‘possible unknown shooting victim’.
Beth said two people died at the scene. The third person jumped into a car with two other people, who moments later attacked a police vehicle. The officer took the victim to a hospital where the person was pronounced dead, Beth said.
Wright said investigators reviewed surveillance video of the scene. The tavern installed video cameras a few years ago, Beth said, but he does not know if the surveillance video came from the business.
Wright calls it a complex investigation involving several crime scenes.
“Detectives have followed up on several clues and gathered evidence from surveillance videos during extensive canvases in the area,” he said.
A man living near the bar, Peter Ploskee, told WLS-TV he heard gunshots, looked out of a window and saw people running from the bar in all directions. ‘
“It was just chaos,” he said. “People just run, people shout.”
Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers calls it a ‘senseless tragedy’ and says he and his wife ‘think of the families and loved ones affected and the entire Kenosha community as they mourn and struggle with another tragic incident of gun violence. ‘
It was the latest in a recent series of shooting incidents across the country, including the murder of eight people Thursday in a FedEx warehouse in Indianapolis. Last month, four people were killed in an office shooting in California, eight people were fatally shot at massage parlors in the Atlanta area, and ten were killed in gunfire at a supermarket in Boulder, Colorado.
The nearby town of Kenosha was the scene of serious unrest last summer after police shot a young black man, Jacob Blake, and left him paralyzed. A white Illinois teenager is accused of fatally shooting two people during the Kenosha protests. Kyle Rittenhouse of Antioch is charged with murder and attempted murder in the August 25 shooting. He pleaded not guilty and said he shot in self-defense.