POLICE: 16 year-old-dead dead after chase between two vehicles
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Wichita police say a 16-year-old girl is dead and three teenagers are in custody after shots were fired while two vehicles chased each other.
The Wichita Police Department said 16-year-old Azuri Jones is the city’s latest homicide victim.
Police Capt. Jeff Weible said officers went to an area near Wichita State University Thursday afternoon after receiving calls about shots being fired.
Around 1:15 p.m. Thursday, police started getting reports of a disturbance with a weapon near 15th and Belmont. Witnesses said two vehicles were chasing each other through a neighborhood. The witnesses also heard gunshots.
A short time later, a vehicle carrying a group of teenagers arrived at Wesley Medical Center, with the 16-year-old victim in the car. She died from her wounds. The other people in the vehicle were also teenagers. They were not injured.
The other vehicle, which had been stolen, was recovered after the suspects fled on foot. Weible says a preliminary investigation indicates the groups in the two cars knew each other.
Police officers got a description of the suspect’s vehicle and found it. They say it was a stolen vehicle. The suspects fled on foot, but officers found them near 17th North and Hillside.
The Wichita Police Department arrested two 17-year-old males and a 16-year-old male all on charges of 1st-degree murder and criminal discharge of a firearm into an occupied vehicle. One of the 17-year-olds was also arrested on a charge of felon in possession of a firearm.
“Any time that there’s violence with teens, it’s alarming and concerning,” Weible said. “It’s going to take not only the Wichita Police Department but the community as a whole to intervene in some of that violence. So it’s going to take efforts on the parts of parents, loved ones, community members, all to help in identifying who may be carrying guns, especially teenagers, and to help us curb some of this violence.”
The investigation is ongoing.