A man was killed and four people were injured in a shooting at a large gathering on Cullen Boulevard in southeast Houston
A man was killed and four other people were injured early Sunday when gunfire broke out at a large gathering in the 13300 block of Cullen Boulevard in southeast Houston. Houston police said a fight broke out as the crowd, gathered at a shopping center known locally as "Club Chevron" or the "Chevron Center," was leaving, and someone in a passing SUV fired into the crowd before people fired back. No suspect was in custody as of Sunday afternoon, and investigators were reviewing surveillance video from nearby businesses.
A man was killed and four other people were injured early Sunday when a fight among a crowd of hundreds at a southeast Houston shopping center turned into a shootout, according to the Houston Police Department.
Officers responded around 4 a.m. to the 13300 block of Cullen Boulevard, a stretch of the South Acres and Sunnyside area where a gas station lot and shopping center is known to locals as "Club Chevron" or the "Chevron Center," even though no sign identifies it as a gathering spot. Someone had reserved the space that night, and people had been playing pool and smoking hookah before the shooting, HPD Detective Alex Vinogradov said.
As attendees started leaving, a verbal argument turned physical, according to Vinogradov. An SUV that was pulling away from the area then made a U-turn on Cullen Boulevard and passed back by the shopping center on the opposite side of the street. Someone inside the SUV opened fire into the crowd, and people nearby shot back at the vehicle, Vinogradov said.
When officers arrived, they found hundreds of people still in the parking lot and said they heard gunfire from at least two shooters. Houston Fire Department paramedics found two men with gunshot wounds and took them to a hospital, where one was pronounced dead. Three more people made their way to hospitals on their own: two had been shot and one had been beaten during the fight. Police said they were still trying to determine exactly how the fifth victim was hurt. Detectives told reporters Sunday afternoon they expect the four survivors to recover.
No suspect description had been released as of Sunday, and no weapon had been recovered. Investigators said they planned to review surveillance footage from nearby businesses once they opened for the day. Police have not said whether the man killed was one of the two found with gunshot wounds by paramedics or whether charges have been filed against anyone in the shooting.
Vinogradov said the size of the crowd was not unusual for the location. A private security guard had previously worked the lot to keep large, unauthorized gatherings from forming there, he said, but the guard has not been on duty recently.
"There was a private security guard that used to be here to prevent private gatherings like this from happening," Vinogradov said. "Since the guard hasn't been working, gatherings like this has been happening more often."
The shooting is the latest violence tied to overnight crowds at the Cullen Boulevard lot, where residents say people regularly gather to drink and smoke into the early morning hours. Sunday's gunfire came just hours after a separate, unrelated shooting killed a woman and wounded three other people at a home in the Sunnyside area, though police have not linked the two incidents.
Homicide detectives are handling the investigation and are asking anyone with information to call HPD Homicide at 713-308-3600 or Crime Stoppers at 713-222-8477, where tips can be submitted anonymously. Police had not announced any arrests as of Sunday afternoon, and the identity of the man killed had not been released pending notification of his family.
