Triple fatal shooting in Richmond ‘very similar’ to drive-by in Oakland earlier this month, police say

RICHMOND — A Father’s Day shooting that killed three people and injured five others had similarities to a drive-by shooting in Oakland earlier this month, and investigators are exploring whether the two were connected, a police official said.

They’re also working to identify a vehicle seen among the several leaving the shooting scene.

Richmond police Sgt. Aaron Pomeroy said police have received information regarding both potential avenues of investigation.

“We’re following leads,” he said. “It’s just moving a lot slower than normal.”

Authorities on Wednesday identified one of the three people who died as 18-year-old Andres Morales Garcia, of Richmond. Identities of the other two victims have not been publicly confirmed.

Pomeroy said one of the five wounded who had life-threatening injuries has stabilized and is expected to survive. The other four also are expected to recover.

Police have been investigating “pretty much non-stop” since the Sunday shooting, Pomeroy said. Gunmen opened fire at a house party in the 2100 block of Dunn Avenue, west of 23rd Street in the northern part of the city, police said.

Officers were called there about 10:55 p.m. Sunday. Police said upon arriving, they saw a chaotic scene of people running from a house and cars racing away, some of them carrying victims.

The shooting was the second-deadliest in the Bay Area this year, topped only by the May 26 mass shooting at a Valley Transportation Authority railyard in San Jose that killed nine people. The gunman in that shooting, a VTA employee, fatally shot himself.

The Richmond shooting also came one day after a one person died and seven were wounded in a shooting at Lake Merritt, and two weeks after a drive-by shooting in Oakland wounded five.

Police have said the party appears to have been part of a celebration related to the Guatemalan town of San Juan Atitán. The party had been promoted on Facebook, drawing “three or four times the crowd” of the 15 the hosts expected, Pomeroy said.

The residents who hosted the party appear to be from an Indigenous people and don’t speak Spanish, one of “several obstacles” he said investigators have faced.

Police have said they suspect at least two shooters and that investigators have not determined whether they attended the party. Police have not identified any suspects or offered a motive.

Police have not said what kind of vehicle they’re trying to identify, other than that they have reason to be interested in it.

The shootings brought Richmond’s homicide total to 12 in 2021. One of them was investigated by the California Highway Patrol.