Authorities say two gunmen opened fire in a Kansas City, Kansas, bar and shot nine people, killing four early Sunday.
The shooting is believed to have stemmed from an earlier dispute, police reported on Sunday afternoon.
Officers were called at 1.30am on Sunday to the Tequila KC Bar in the city, to respond to a mass shooting, police spokesman Thomas Tomasic told local media.
He said the two men had apparently been in some sort of disagreement with people inside the bar, left, then returned with handguns.
“We think there was something that happened in the bar earlier probably,” Tomasic said. “Unfortunately, they left and decided to take it to another level, came back and started shooting.”
About 40 people were inside the small bar when gunfire erupted around 1.30am, Tomasic said. The gunfire sent people running for the exits, with the injured leaving trails of blood as they fled. One of the injured was trying to get a ride to the hospital when ambulances arrived.
“It’s a pretty small bar, so if you have two guys come in and start shooting, people are just running, running anywhere they can,” Tomasic said.
All four men who were killed were Hispanic, but Tomasic said authorities do not believe the shooting was racially motivated. The shooting happened in a neighborhood with a large Hispanic population.
Tomasic cautioned that police were still investigating exactly what happened. He said they were reviewing surveillance video and interviewing witnesses while looking for the gunmen.
“Obviously being a bar at 1.30, stories vary a lot,” he said.
Among the dead was one man in his late 50s, another in his mid-30s and two in their mid-20s, police said. Authorities did not immediately release their names.
However, Juan Ramirez, of Kansas City, Kansas, told the Kansas City Star that his 29-year-old nephew was among those killed. He said his nephew left behind a 6-year-old son and a four-year-old daughter.
“I don’t wish this upon anybody,” Ramirez said.
