Three people shot while sitting in their cars in suburban Sydney
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SYDNEY – Police in the Australian state of New South Wales announced that three people sitting in two parked cars were injured in a public shooting in Greenacre, a suburb in south-western Sydney, early on Sunday morning.
One man, aged 25, was found injured in one parked vehicle. Another man, aged 22, and a teenage girl, aged 19, were injured in a separate parked vehicle.
The Sydney Morning Herald, citing Australian police, reported that the victims were sitting in their parked cars in Mayvic Street when they were attacked at about 2.15am.
All three people were taken to hospital and both men are in critical condition, according to the police.
The teenager is reportedly in stable condition.
About five minutes after the shooting, a vehicle was reportedly set alight in a nearby area, Regents Park, and inquiries were under way to determine if the incidents are linked, the police added.
Detective Superintendent Simon Glasser told local media that the investigation was in its infancy and that the police believe it was a “targeted attack”.
The Sydney Morning Herald said that the Australian police were looking at whether the shooting is part of gang-related crime in the city.
They are looking for “at least one male” in connection to the shooting, but it was not known if more people were involved.
Potential gangland links to the attack were “certainly an avenue for our investigation”.
“However, at this early stage, there’s no direct link to anything ongoing,” Supt Glasser said.
“We haven’t found any direct information to attribute (the shooting) to any ongoing conflicts at the moment,” he added.
Police have not identified the victims and were not sure if they were the intended targets of the attack.
“We’re trying to establish what both parties were doing at the location,” Supt Glasser said.
Crime scenes have been established at both locations as police began inquiries.
They are collecting closed-circuit television footage from around the crime scene and looking for eyewitnesses. XINHUA
