What started as a suspected road rage incident in a Houston neighborhood turned into a deadly shooting rampage that stretched 24 miles of Texas highways, leaving four people dead, including the gunman, police said.
The violence unfolded in three different sites, beginning around 1 p.m. Wednesday with a woman being shot numerous times inside her vehicle on Dairy Ashford Road near U.S. 90 in Sugar Land. Police say she was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead.
“We have a very tragic incident today, and there are several moving parts,” Houston Police Lt. Larry Crowson said during a news conference.
The shooting was initially considered motivated by road rage, but the department confirmed in a statement that it was “not a random act of road rage violence.”
According to KPRC, investigators from the Sugar Land Police Department later confirmed that the victim was in a relationship with the gunman.
Approximately 45 minutes after the initial shooting, the suspect drove to a mechanic shop on Fondren Road in southwest Houston, where he allegedly got into an altercation with the owner and opened fire again, killing two individuals, according to Lt. Crowson.
“There was a report that a male in a silver Ford Escape, which matched the description of the vehicle in the Sugar Land shooting, had been involved in an altercation with a mechanic there,” Crowson told reporters.
As the defendant departed the area, he shot and killed the 51-year-old mechanic.
Another man was fatally shot after coming out of a nearby warehouse and recording the incident on his cellphone, according to police, using security footage that apparently captured the altercation.
“The suspect then fired several shots, killing that witness,” according to Crowson.
According to KPRC, the fatally shot mechanic was known for helping everybody who walked into his business.
About 15 minutes later, police responded to a third incident three miles away on Creekbend Drive, near South Gessner Road.
Officers discovered the 42-year-old suspect inside the vehicle, dead of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, Crawson said.
Police closed many roads as detectives analyzed the extensive crime scenes, attempting to discover what caused the fatal chain of events.
The identities of the three victims and the suspect have yet to be published.