No fewer than three people were shot dead on Saturday night and four others injured at a luxury home near Beverly Hills, at what US police described as a gathering at a short-term rental property.
Overnight, emergency personnel flocked to the posh address in Los Angeles’ Benedict Canyon neighbourhood where they discovered three bodies inside a parked car.
Two of the four patients receiving critical injury care on Saturday were among the other four.
The incident took place in a neighbourhood tucked between Beverly Hills and Bel Air, where multimillion dollar mansions with lush landscaping enjoy breathtaking views of the Los Angeles cityscape. It followed two horrific shootings in California that lost 18 lives.
Detectives investigating the attack say it happened at a ‘short term rental home,’ The Los Angeles Times reported.
Homes close to the scene of the shooting — which were not involved — were shown as available on AirBnB at up to $10,000 for a weekend.
The property at which the shooting took place was not listed on the site.
Police said there was some kind of gathering at the location.
‘We called it a gathering, until we can interview some of the people that were here to determine exactly what kind of gathering it was,’ Los Angeles Police Department’s Bruce Borihanh told reporters.
‘Investigators are also going door to door and looking for additional surveillance video, or any evidence that can help us determine what happened here and why these victims were shot.’
Africa Today News, New York recalls that President Biden had on Tuesday called on Congress to act quickly to ban assault weapons, as California reeled from two deadly mass shootings in less than 48 hours.
Africa Today News, New York reports that a group of senators had on Monday reintroduced a federal Assault Weapons Ban and legislation that would raise the minimum purchase age for assault weapons to 21.