WATCH: Montgomery Mayor, police address triple homicide on Troy Highway
Montgomery Mayor Steven Reed and acting Police Chief John Hall spoke to the city at a news conference that Action 8 aired live Wednesday afternoon to address the triple homicide at a Hispanic grocery store on Troy Highway.
As Action 8 News has reported, the shooting happened just before 9PM Tuesday in the 4100 block of Troy Highway, at the location of Tienda Los Hermanos. Robbery was the apparent motive.
Hispanic businesses in the city have appeared to be a recent target of robbers, something that Mayor Steven Reed said, “We will not accept.”
To the Hispanic community, Reed said, “We see you. We hear you. We’re not going to stand for this.”
Part of the news conference included comments from a member of the Montgomery Police Department speaking in Spanish.
Once officers and fire medics arrived on the scene, they found two men with fatal gunshot wounds. They have been identified as 50-year-old George Elijah, Jr. and 20-year-old Daniel Lopez.
Another man was taken to a hospital with a life-threatening gunshot wound. He later died. He has been identified as 43-year-old Romero Lopez.
Reed said two of the shooting victims were family members, and the third person was there “just to do a little shopping” and visit with store employees.
The shootings took place inside the store, police said.
The shootings occurred hours after Reed urged city council members to support a $6 million proposal for a community intervention program to address crime in Montgomery.
“People working their jobs in their community, trying to make it day-to-day, week-to-week should not be preyed upon. And that’s what we had last night,” Mayor Steven Reed said during the news conference.
City Councilman Oronde Mitchell, who represents the area, said the shooting happened during a robbery at the store. Mitchell noted that crimes have targeted Hispanic-owned businesses in the area where patrons are thought to be more likely to pay in cash instead of using debit cards or other electronic transactions.
Mitchell said the city needs to do a better job at building trust with the community and to take other steps to address crime in the city.
Acting Police Chief John Hall says in response, some officers have had their schedules adjusted in order to help combat robberies. As Action 8 News reported earlier this week, business robberies are up 180% compared to this time last year.
Hall says that an additional police detail has been created to further tackle robberies and violent crimes, and the police department is working with the FBI to make arrests. Hall says he would be seeking federal charges when the arrests are made.
Hall says the National Ballistics Intelligence Service is being used to help identify the weapons used.
If you have information to help investigators, call Central Alabama CrimeStoppers at (334) 215-STOP.
(Copyright 2024 The Associated Press contributed to this report. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.)
