BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — A shooting outside a home in a blighted neighborhood left two people dead and three others wounded early Wednesday, just hours after police and community members rallied for safer streets.
A 25-year-old man and a 19-year-old woman were shot and killed in a botched robbery about 2 a.m. on Buffalo's east side, where the number of vacant properties rivals the number of occupied homes, police said. Joseph Lovett, of Buffalo, and Jamie Norton, of Derby, were pronounced dead at the scene, police spokesman Michael DeGeorge said.
Detectives said another man and two other women were believed to have been shot while sitting in a vehicle in front of the house.
Late Wednesday, a police official characterized the shooting as "an attempted robbery that went bad," but relatives of Lovett said they believe Norton was targeted after testifying before a grand jury in an apparent homicide investigation Tuesday.