10 hurt, 2 in surgery after shooting in Lakeland

All right thank you for coming this evening. My name is Sam Taylor. I am in the chief of police with the local police department behind me. We have assistant chief steve Pacheco who is the chief of our investigations. And to my right your left is Assistant Chief Marvin Tarver, who’s the chief of assistant chief over patrol our neighborhood services as we call it. So what I’m going to tell you is the information that we know as of one minute ago. Um um if you’ve been down on the up in the third floor and you can see the activity that’s going on. These things are constantly changing and the information that I’m getting ready to give you change like five minutes ago as to what we originally put out *** press conference. So please, I know you, you hear people say that all the time, but this is certainly preliminary and subject to change. So um at about 3 43 this afternoon, the Lakeland Police Department started to receive multiple phone calls of *** shooting that had just occurred in the 900 block of North Iowa at Iowa and plum. Within one minute. We had four officers on the scene. They located three victims who were shot on the scene and uh several victims, the officers were told had been transported via personal vehicle and were no longer on the scene to Lakeland Regional Health. Three of the victims were transported as I said by emergency medical services. Um they were all adult males Described as between the ages of 20 and 35. We have to that as of the last report are in critical condition. One is in surgery and the other is either in surgery or headed to surgery and one was uh, shot in the abdomen and the other one was shot in the face or the jaw area. Um, the other Eight victims have non life threatening injuries. So we initially notified you guys, we thought we had nine victims. Now we had another one. As we were at the hospital, another gentleman walked up and presented himself and he’s got *** Ricochet Williams. So now we’re up to 10 victims. This is what I can tell you that we’ve learned so far. Um, apparently there was *** dark colored Nissan four door pulled up. Uh, didn’t slow down. I just looked at some ring cellphone video 30 seconds before I came down here, there was *** four door Nissan and I’m gonna show you *** photograph of that we, that we took off the site. I know it’s blurry. We’ll certainly try to get you an additional photographs as we can and better photographs and something that’s not as blurry. Um, but it is *** four door, dark blue Nissan with dark tinted windows and *** temporary tag. Um, the vehicle slowed. It did not stop and the four windows went down. It appears it was occupied by four shooters in the vehicle and they started firing from all four windows of the vehicle and shooting males on both sides of the street. Obviously after the shooting, the vehicle left at *** high rate of speed northbound on Iowa Avenue made an eastbound turn on memorial boulevard and we are actively searching for that vehicle. Now. Um, we have reason to believe that this was *** targeted event, that it was not *** random act. Um, we did locate *** quantity of marijuana at the scene which would indicate that obviously there was some narcotic sales or sales of marijuana going on at the time. Um, and whether that is significant or related to this, it’s unknown right now that the texas are still trying to get through that, uh, process. Um, we will be out most of the night trying to figure out who these individuals are in the vehicle, trying to locate the vehicle. Certainly we ask for the public’s help if they see this vehicle and again we’ll try to provide you *** digital photograph of that so we can kind of improve the quality of that as best we can. Um, we have about 25 Uniform Patrol officers at one time were at the scene and about 15 detectives. This is something that Does’t happen in Lakeland. I’ve been here 34 years and I can tell you, I have never worked an event where this many people have been shot at one time ever. Um, it actually um saddens me to some extent that uh, you know, we consider ourselves to be *** small town, some situated between Tampa and Orlando and when stuff like this happens, you know, it just kind of hits home with me *** little bit that, uh, you know, maybe we’re not *** small town anymore and it actually is pretty sad. So with that, to the extent I can, I will answer any questions that you guys have. So you we always like to ask, is there *** threat to the public? Is that difficult to say when it’s you think *** targeted incident, although you don’t have any suspects arrested, what would you say to people who might be worried for their safety at this hour? Sure, good question. Um, we don’t, we don’t believe there’s any reason that the public would need to be um, concerned right now. We think that the individuals in the car shot at and shot who they wanted to shoot it was an intentional act. It certainly wasn’t *** random, just *** drive by shooting. And like I say things like this just don’t happen in Lakeland, but today it did this evening, which is disappointing. We did not have, we do not have *** second. That’s not correct. I mean, no, I don’t think there is. Um, you know, it’s, it’s it’s *** random act and I said it’s disappointed. I’ve been disappointing. Um, I’ve been doing this for start my 35th year, uh, Wednesday february 1st and uh, I’ve never seen anything like this before. I don’t know if it’s as *** result of uh I don’t, I don’t know what it’s as *** result of, I don’t know, we’ll figure that out. But I don’t, I don’t suspect there’s *** drug we’re going on. This is the first incident happened now. Certainly we’re gonna be on heightened alert the rest of the evening, you know, for some sort of retaliatory act. If that, if that comes and you know, then maybe we can have that conversation. Maybe *** start of something. Certainly our intelligence folks are working on monitoring different aspects of the uh, the social media world to find out what the chatter is as all police departments across this country do so. And we haven’t seen anything like that. That traffic going to the apartment complex all the time. Police department leading up to today. It is an area that’s known. It’s *** uh it’s *** challenge neighborhood. It’s rental *** lot of rental properties in there. So it’s an area that we’ve, we’ve paid quite *** quite *** lot of attention to over the past years. Um, but it’s tough. I mean, it’s ***, it’s ***, it’s *** tough neighborhood and like say there are some challenges and the neighbors would not be incorrect. We’re aware of that and we have put *** lot of resources and manpower into trying to fix that. They will continue to do. So I think it’s too early. Um, certainly there’s some chatter online about that and we’re certainly cognizant of that and aware of that. So I don’t wanna I don’t want to dismiss that as *** possibility. And certainly maybe at the scene, I don’t know if we recovered any weapons at the scene. I don’t think we recovered weapons at the scene. What I can tell you is we did locate *** rifle in one of the vehicles at the hospital, that one of the personal vehicles that which used to transport one of the victims in plain view. So that’s interesting. Good question. I don’t know that. We’re still trying to figure that out questions you just ask? Yeah. Yeah. No, no, that’s fine. We don’t know that. That’s certainly *** possibility. I don’t want to say definitively, no, and I don’t want to say definitively, yes, it’s certainly within the realm of possibilities. Um, Some are cooperating, some are not cooperating, Some that have non life threatening injuries, have decided that they don’t have any idea why this happened. Um, and some are telling us everything that they know about it, we believe. So there was *** school bus that had just dropped the Children off in the neighborhood probably *** minute before the shooting occurred. So I don’t know if those Children, I don’t have any indication that those kids were in the neighborhood, they had dispersed and gone wherever they live at the time. So, but the school bus had on the ring video, you can see *** school bus dropping on the video that we’ve seen dropping the kids off and then shortly after that the car comes to and the shooting occurs. I’ll be with *** terrible, absolutely horrific. So I said, I’ve been doing this for 34 years starting on 35th year and I’ve never, ever seen not in Lakeland. This just doesn’t happen in Lakeland, but today it did. So, which is disappointing. Um, uh, I think it’s *** block from florida Avenue. It’s *** block from Memorial boulevard and maybe maybe *** couple of blocks from florida is *** main thoroughfare. Yeah, massachusetts. Yes, sir. Yeah, yeah, major thoroughfare. Yeah, I’m sorry. This one want to be accurate in my answer. Um, uh, we certainly will have extra patrols out tonight and we’ll have, like I said, we’ve got 15 detectives that will work all night long if that’s what it takes to figure this out. We certainly would like to uh, identify the folks that read that vehicle. We’d like to locate that vehicle. Um, for those of you that know me and I know quite *** few of you that are sitting around here. You know, this is not typical for us. We typically don’t call *** press conference at seven o’clock at night. I mean, you’ve been following us for *** long time, that many press conferences that we called at seven o’clock on *** monday night. So we’re taking this very seriously. Um, um, and that’s why I’m standing up here, front of today because we want to locate this vehicle and locate the folks that were in that vehicle. Um, it’s very important that we, we do both of those. Sure. Yeah. At some point we will get you some video. As I said, I was just, I looked at *** ring video 30 seconds before I walked down here and that was the first video I saw. So let me give my detective some time to digest that. And we will certainly get you out, Robin. We’ll put it in *** drop box and we’ll certainly, I don’t know if it’ll be tonight, but we will, we will get that to you as quick as we can get it to you. So, and I apologize for the quality of the video, the photograph. That’s the best we can come up with right now. So, and we tried two or three different things. So, but trust me, the other ones look much worse than this one. So I know it’s early. We don’t know the exact details of what went on, but we did have *** situation today where legislation was introduced that would allow, can talk about that in relation to this incident like this would make it harder for your officers to investigate. Yeah, I could talk about it. I don’t want to, I understand your question, but I’ll let the legislators legislate and I’ll be the police chief for today. So we’ll just leave it at that. So There is the process of doing that. I can tell you *** lot. So uh, we’ve, we’ve identified at least two different calibers, at least 2 23 with *** rifle round and *** nine millimeter. So there may be other calibers as well. So what they do, they were sitting outside on the sides of each side of the roadway. Um, um, and we will have to find out exactly why they were sitting out there. Uh, said we did locate *** quantity of marijuana that was, I think it was in the somewhere on the roadway that was secret was hidden. Um, um, so I would suspect I probably have *** pretty good idea what some of them were doing. I’m not saying all of them, but there was probably some of that going on. Um, but you know, some may have just been out enjoying the evening as well. So both sides of the street, they’re, they’re doing that now. They may be able to establish that relationship between, I don’t know that’s uh, they’re still in the process of obviously the first priority was to get them treated and then once we can get them stabilized and treated and get an interview with them find out that they live in the area where they’re visiting, you know what, why they were there. So to the extent they’ll tell us both sides of the street. Yes, ma’am, some kind of drug situation, you know, I think it has some some aspects of that. Yeah, I don’t know that all the folks that were shot were that way and I don’t want to characterize that because I don’t know um I do find it interesting that there’s *** felony amount of marijuana located there and um so, you know, it’s, but we can we can draw some some conclusions, but it’s still *** little bit early yet, so and well this may be way too soon to tell. But I mean gun violence in general, do you guys have *** solution to preventing these and stopping these kind of shootings? I’m being very careful with my answer. Um there are there are things that that have been tried all over the country and if I had *** solution to it, I probably wouldn’t be standing here, I would sell it to every police chief in the nation and we would all uh implement that. So uh I don’t think there’s *** one size fits all. Maybe what works in Lakeland may not work in new york, may not work in boston, but it works here in Lakeland. So um we have *** very good police department here. We have guys that gals that work very hard to keep the streets safe in the city safe and we have *** very safe city. That’s why this is so um shocking and jarring I guess for me personally because like I said, I I I’ve not witnessed anything to this extent this magnitude now some of the injuries are minor there ricochets and they’re you know they’re they’re they’re not serious injuries but anytime you have that many rounds fired and that many people that were in jeopardy and the kids are. I mean who knows where some of those rifle rounds are going. I mean they you know we may not ever be able to locate the exact how many houses all those rifle rounds went through. So we’re gonna make every attempt. So um that’s that’s the concerning part for me is that uh you know I know how hard that all these guys and gals who put this uniform on every day, not just in Lakeland but all all over come to work every day with the the idea of keeping everybody safe and when something like this happens it kind of uh is *** jarring reminder that you know um this is *** serious business you know and people can get hurt and officers can get hurt. And you know obviously we had 10 people here today said that yesterday. I don’t know I haven’t haven’t heard that the first time I’ve heard that. That’s that’s certainly he could have reported if he reported it. We can certainly let you know that. So I’m I’m unaware of that. Yeah they could have could have been caught in the crossfire. They could have been you know just randomly sitting out enjoying the evening and you know we don’t know yet. We’re still trying to sort through all that. So so anything else? You got it? Thank you guys sorry for the short notice but we wanted to get this out to you as quickly as we could get it out to you. So um if there’s any follow up questions we’ll certainly do what we can tonight. They’re gonna be very busy through the rest of the evening but you know we’ll be available to you tomorrow. I don’t know that we’ll have any updates tonight. If we make an arrest we’ll let you know. So I know everybody will be waiting on us all night long. Right so much Okay.

Police: 10 hurt, 2 in surgery after shooting in Lakeland

Updated: 8:02 PM EST Jan 30, 2023

The Lakeland Police Department said a shooting left several people injured Monday. The shooting occurred in the area of Iowa Avenue North and Plum Street Monday afternoon around 3:43 p.m.Police initially said nine people were hurt, but they later learned that an additional person had injuries. Two people had critical injuries, and eight people had non-life-threatening injuries. Police said the two victims with critical injuries are getting surgery. “One is in surgery and the other is either in surgery or headed to surgery,” Lakeland Police Chief Sam Taylor said. The police chief said some of the victims are being more cooperative than others who were hurt.”Some are cooperating, some are not cooperating. Some that had non-life-threatening injuries have decided that they don’t have any idea why this happened. And some are telling us everything that they know about it,” Taylor said. Four suspects in a four-door dark blue Nissan are believed to be involved in the shooting. “The vehicle slowed. It did not stop, and the four windows went down. It appears it was occupied by four shooters in the vehicle, and they started firing from all four windows of the vehicle and shooting males on both sides of the street,” Taylor said. He added that the shooting appears to be targeted. “We have reason to believe that this was a targeted event, that it was not a random act,” Taylor said. Taylor said a large amount of marijuana was found at the scene, but it’s unknown if it’s related. “We did locate a quantity of marijuana at the scene, which would indicate that obviously there was some narcotic sales or sales with marijuana going on at the time. And whether that is significant or related to this, it’s unknown,” Taylor said. The Lakeland police chief said he was shocked that this happened in the community. “This is something that doesn’t happen in Lakeland. I’ve been here 34 years, and I can tell you I have never worked an event where this many people have been shot at one time ever,” Taylor said.Police said a Ring video showed kids were getting off the bus just before the gunfire, putting them in jeopardy.“Maybe we’re not a small town anymore. It actually is pretty sad,” Taylor said. Police are working to locate the suspects’ vehicle. Top headlines:Florida mom, daughter discover abandoned newborn in woods behind their houseMom files wrongful death lawsuit after 12-year-old Orlando boy dies during rowing practiceOne person in critical condition after car goes into Orange County retention pond

LAKELAND, Fla. —

The Lakeland Police Department said a shooting left several people injured Monday.

The shooting occurred in the area of Iowa Avenue North and Plum Street Monday afternoon around 3:43 p.m.

Police initially said nine people were hurt, but they later learned that an additional person had injuries.

Two people had critical injuries, and eight people had non-life-threatening injuries.

Police said the two victims with critical injuries are getting surgery.

“One is in surgery and the other is either in surgery or headed to surgery,” Lakeland Police Chief Sam Taylor said.

The police chief said some of the victims are being more cooperative than others who were hurt.

“Some are cooperating, some are not cooperating. Some that had non-life-threatening injuries have decided that they don’t have any idea why this happened. And some are telling us everything that they know about it,” Taylor said.

Four suspects in a four-door dark blue Nissan are believed to be involved in the shooting.

“The vehicle slowed. It did not stop, and the four windows went down. It appears it was occupied by four shooters in the vehicle, and they started firing from all four windows of the vehicle and shooting males on both sides of the street,” Taylor said.

He added that the shooting appears to be targeted.

“We have reason to believe that this was a targeted event, that it was not a random act,” Taylor said.

Taylor said a large amount of marijuana was found at the scene, but it’s unknown if it’s related.

“We did locate a quantity of marijuana at the scene, which would indicate that obviously there was some narcotic sales or sales with marijuana going on at the time. And whether that is significant or related to this, it’s unknown,” Taylor said.

The Lakeland police chief said he was shocked that this happened in the community.

“This is something that doesn’t happen in Lakeland. I’ve been here 34 years, and I can tell you I have never worked an event where this many people have been shot at one time ever,” Taylor said.

Police said a Ring video showed kids were getting off the bus just before the gunfire, putting them in jeopardy.

“Maybe we’re not a small town anymore. It actually is pretty sad,” Taylor said.

Police are working to locate the suspects’ vehicle.

Top headlines: