One person has died and four others are critically injured after a shooting at a church in California on Sunday, local police say.
Orange County deputies responded after dispatch received a call at 1:26 p.m. about a shooting inside the Geneva Presbyterian Church.
The church is located on the 24000 block of El Toro Road in Laguna Woods, a community in Southern California of about 18,000 people roughly 50 miles (80 kilometres) southeast of Los Angeles.
Another victim is suffering minor injuries.
About 30 people witnessed the violence and a majority of those inside the church are believed to be of Taiwanese descent, according to Carrie Braun, a sheriff’s spokesperson.
Investigators were looking at many factors, including whether the bloodshed could be a hate crime and whether the gunman was known to the church community, she said.
More details were expected from a sheriff’s department news conference scheduled for 5 p.m.
Police detained an adult male suspect at the scene and have recovered a weapon that may have been involved in the shooting.
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The deceased victim died on the scene. All victims are adults and were transported to hospital.
Fire and rescue personnel were at the scene, treating and transporting multiple patients to the hospital, the Orange County Fire Authority said.
It is so far unclear how many people were shot or what the motive was behind the shooting.
Two people were also killed on Sunday after a shooting at a bustling Houston flee market, authorities said. Three others were also taken to the hospital.
The shooting erupted from an “altercation” involving at least two guns and all five of the people, according to Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez.
He said no “innocent bystanders” were injured.
Laguna Woods was built as a senior living community and later became a city. More than 80% of residents in the city are at least 65.
Thousands of people were shopping at the the market 22 kilometres north of Houston’s downtown when the shooting began around 1 p.m. Sunday, Gonzalez said on Twitter.
Both incidents follow the mass shooting that killed at least ten people at a Tops supermarket in Buffalo on Saturday.
The incident is being investigated as both a hate crime and a case of racially motivated violent extremism, according to law enforcement.
Out of the 13 victims, 11 were Black and two were white while the shooter is white, police said.
— With files from Reuters and The Associated Press
© 2022 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
