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Vegas theater shooting: Many shooters, few casualties

A shooting outside a Las Vegas movie theater between two non-gang "groups" leaves two critically wounded and a third with a minor injury.

  • By Ken Ritter Associated Press

| LAS VEGAS

An overnight shooting in a parking structure outside a Las Vegas Strip movie theater left two people critically wounded and one person with a minor injury, police said Wednesday.

Police don't believe the shooting just after midnight was a random act, but Officer Laura Meltzer said the shooter or shooters hadn't been identified. She added initial reports from a police spokesman at the scene that the shooting happened in the theater lobby were incorrect.

"The theater had nothing to do with it," Meltzer told The Associated Press. "They were not coming from a movie. It was not in the theater lobby."

Investigators believe the shooting stemmed from an ongoing conflict between members of two groups that squared off in the parking structure near the UA Showcase 8 theater, Meltzer said. The parking structure lobby has entrances to the theater and to Las Vegas Boulevard.

It wasn't immediately clear how many shooters there were, but Meltzer said multiple shots were fired.

Police arrived to find one of the most seriously wounded people in the parking structure lobby and another in an elevator car on the fifth floor of the six-story parking structure. Both were reported to be in critical condition at University Medical Center in Las Vegas. Their names weren't made public.

A third victim was found near the street in front of the elevator lobby. He was treated at the scene for an injury that Meltzer said wasn't believed to be life-threatening. The wounded were described as males, but their ages weren't immediately known.

Meltzer said investigators don't believe the confrontation between the two groups was gang-related, but they were still trying to determine the relationship between them.

Police and property security officers closed exits and entrances to the Showcase Mall parking structure for more than two hours while they investigated, the police spokeswoman said.

According to movie show times, the last features of the night let out shortly before the shooting was reported. Meltzer said she didn't know if anyone inside the theater heard or knew about the shooting outside.

"There's no indication in the call that any evacuation was needed," she said.

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