SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, Sept. 3, 2023 (Gephardt Daily) — Salt Lake City police are investigating after a pre-dawn fatal shooting in the city’s downtown entertainment district.
Police responded after a 9-1-1 call came to dispatch at 4:04 a.m., and arrived at the scene, a parking lot at 128 W. 300 South, a parking lot in between Pierpont Avenue and 300 South. They found community members performing life-saving efforts on the victim, and officers took over, but the man died at the site of the attack.
“When officers arrived, they found a large and chaotic scene,” says a statement issued by the SLCPD Public Relations Department. “Officers arrested two people for interfering with the investigation. Their names and ages will be released once they are booked into the Salt Lake County Metro Jail.
“Officers and detectives are working to identify the shooter. No arrests connected to the shooting itself have been made.”
Detectives are asking that anyone who has information about the shooting, including photos or videos of the moments leading up, during, and after the shooting, to call 801-799-3000.
“There is no known danger to the community. The shooting does not appear to be random…. The parking lot where the shooting happened, however, does remain closed. Community members who have parked cars will not be allowed into the scene until the investigation is complete.”
The SLCPD Homicide Squad will work with the medical examiner’s office to confirm the victim’s name, age, and cause of death, and to notify next-of-kin, the statement says.
Same location in 2022
Sunday’s fatal shooting was in the same parking lot as a fatal assault nearly 14 months earlier, on Sunday July 10 of last year. Victim Yusuf Mohammed, 37, died after being punched in the face “one time without warning or provocation,” says an SLCPD PR news release issued at the time.
Police described that scene as “chaotic scene with more than 100 people on the streets.”
Three days later, 21-year-old Kepueli Penisini was arrested. He later pleaded guilty to manslaughter, a second-degree felony, and was sentenced to a year in jail beginning Jan. 30 of this year.
