Police in Seattle say a shooting early Monday in Seattle's self-declared occupied protest zone in the city's Capitol Hill neighborhood has left one man dead and a 14-year-old boy wounded.
The Seattle Police Department responded to multiple reports of shots fired at about 3 a.m. near 12th Avenue and Pike Street. Police said callers reported several unidentified people had fired shots into a white Jeep that had been at or near one of the barriers of the protest zone.
Susan Gregg, a spokeswoman at Seattle's Harborview Medical Center, reported that one man who was admitted following the shooting had died. Police said the second victim, a 14-year-old male, was hospitalized with gunshot injuries.
No suspects have been publicly identified. Police said they were investigating the incident, but while searching the Jeep for evidence discovered that the crime scene had been "disturbed."
Police say this is the second fatal shooting in the area, which has come to be known as the Capitol Hill Organized Protest zone, or CHOP. It was established June 8 by demonstrators protesting police brutality and the killing of George Floyd after the Seattle Police Department vacated the East Precinct there.
Speaking to reporters at the scene Monday, Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best said, "Enough is enough," and said it was time for the protesters to leave the area for the sake of public safety. She said the two fatal shootings and multiple injuries over the past week and a half demonstrate the situation is "dangerous and unacceptable."
