California, Jan. 24 (BNA): Seven people were killed in two related shootings Monday at agricultural facilities in coastal California, south of San Francisco, in the third mass killing in the state in eight days, including Saturday’s attack on a ballroom that left killed. 11 during the Lunar New Year celebrations.
San Mateo County Sheriff Christina Corpus said officers arrested the suspect in Monday’s shooting, 67-year-old Chunli Chao, after they found him in his car in the parking lot of a sheriff’s sub station.
The sheriff’s office said it found four dead and a fifth with gunshot wounds at a ranch, and officers found three more killed elsewhere several miles away. The killings took place in the suburbs of Half Moon Bay, a city about 30 miles (48 kilometers) south of San Francisco. The two sites were nurseries, Corpus said, and it was not immediately clear how they were related.
The new year saw a shocking string of mass killings in the United States, six in less than three weeks, accounting for 39 deaths. Three of them have occurred in California since Jan. 16, according to a database compiled by the Associated Press, USA Today and Northeastern University. The database tracks every known mass killing of four and does not include a perpetrator committed in the United States since 2006.
Corpus said officials believed Zhao was a worker at one of the facilities and that the victims were workers as well. She said that some workers at one of the facilities lived in the building and the children may have witnessed the shooting.
Corpus said officials have not determined a motive for the shooting.
Half Moon Bay deputy mayor Joaquin Jimenez said the victims included Chinese and Latino farm workers.
The sheriff’s office first received reports of gunfire shortly before 2:30 p.m. and found four dead from gunshot wounds and a fifth person wounded in the first scene.
Shortly thereafter, officers found three more people dead from gunshot wounds at a second location nearby, Capt. Eamonn Allen said in a news release.
About two hours after the first response, the deputy sheriff noticed the suspect, Zhao, in his car parked outside a sheriff’s substation in a strip mall and arrested him, identifying the vehicle by its license plate.
Video of the arrest showed three officers approaching a parked car with weapons drawn. Chow got out of the car, officers pulled him to the ground, put him in handcuffs, and drove away.
Officials said a weapon was found in his car. The video was taken by Katie McHugh, a resident of Half Moon Bay who witnessed the arrest.
The Sheriff’s Department believes that Zhao acted alone.
“We’re still trying to understand exactly what happened and why, but it’s incredibly tragic,” said Senator Josh Baker, who represents the district and described it as a “very close-knit farming community.”
Aerial television footage showed police officers collecting evidence from a farm that has dozens of greenhouses.
Half Moon Bay is a small coastal town with agricultural roots, home to about 12,000 people.
The city and surrounding San Mateo County area are known for the production of flowers and vegetables such as Brussels sprouts. The province allows hemp to be grown in certain areas.
They are a majority white community and about 5% of the population is Asian, according to census data.
“We are tired of today’s tragedy in Half Moon Bay,” Payne said. “We didn’t even have time to grieve those lost in the horrific shooting in Monterey Park. Gun violence must stop.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom tweeted that he was “at a hospital meeting with mass shooting victims when I was pulled over to be briefed on another shooting. This time in Half Moon Bay. Tragedy upon tragedy.”
On January 16, a teenage mother and her child were among six people killed in a Central Valley, California home shooting.
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