A shooting at a strip mall near the Lowell-Hebron border sent police, ambulances, and fire crews rushing to the area Saturday night, and by Sunday, investigators still had not said how many people were shot or what led up to the gunfire. Indiana State Police confirmed the shooting occurred at a commercial strip east of Interstate 65 along State Route 2, and troopers said the scene has since been secured with no ongoing threat to the public.
The shooting happened at a strip mall on the Lowell-Hebron border, adjacent to a busy truck stop off I-65, according to The Times of Northwest Indiana. State police are assisting the Lake County Sheriff's Department in the investigation, a multi-agency arrangement typical for major violent crime cases in this stretch of southern Lake County. As reported by WGN-TV, police presence was seen both outside the strip mall and inside one of the stores as the investigation got underway Saturday night.
Witnesses monitoring the scene described a heavy response of multiple police departments, ambulances, and fire trucks near DW's Country Junction off Route 2, per the Hindustan Times. Eyewitnesses reported officers securing the surrounding commercial area as the response unfolded. Despite the scale of the response, police have not released the number of people shot, their conditions, or any information about what led up to the shooting, per WGN-TV's report.
State Police Say Investigation Remains Ongoing
Indiana State Police have said the investigation into the shooting is ongoing, with no additional information made public as of Sunday. The agency's Lowell Post serves as the District 13 headquarters, overseeing state law enforcement operations across Lake, Porter, LaPorte, Newton, and Jasper counties, according to the Indiana State Police. District troopers routinely coordinate with county sheriff departments on major cases, which explains why state investigators are working the Lowell shooting alongside Lake County deputies rather than the sheriff's office acting alone.
That kind of joint response has precedent in Lake County. In May, the sheriff's department led an independent investigation following an officer-involved shooting at Methodist Hospitals' Northlake Campus in Gary, underscoring the department's role in leading major incident inquiries across the county, as previously reported by Hoodline in its coverage of the Gary hospital shooting.
A Corridor With a History of Gun Violence
This is not the first time the I-65 corridor near Lowell has drawn state police attention for gunfire. In March 2024, Indiana State Police detectives from the Lowell Post investigated a shooting near the Lowell exit in which a semi-truck tire was shot out, leading to attempted murder charges against a Merrillville resident who later surrendered to detectives two days after the incident.
Lowell has also seen other recent violent crime cases. In April, a 26-year-old man was arrested and charged with six felonies, including attempted murder, after he allegedly threatened to kill an officer and lunged with a kitchen knife during a domestic call, as Hoodline reported in its report on the Lowell knife suspect's arrest. That suspect was booked into the Lake County Jail on a $100,000 bond.
Indiana's Permitless Carry Law and Potential Penalties
Indiana has allowed permitless public handgun carry since House Enrolled Act 1296 took effect in July 2022, letting individuals aged 18 and older who are not legally disqualified carry a handgun in public without a state permit, according to the Indiana State Police. The law kept background check requirements in place for purchases from federally licensed dealers, but it removed the prior licensing hurdle for carrying in public.
Should charges eventually be filed in the Lowell shooting, Indiana law treats attempted murder as a Level 1 felony, carrying a statutory prison sentence ranging from 20 to 40 years with an advisory sentence of 30 years, per Justia. Actual sentencing would depend on judicial findings and any aggravating or mitigating factors, and no charges have been announced in connection with Saturday's shooting.
Lake County's court system has faced its own recent turbulence, with a high-profile homicide trial collapsing into a mistrial earlier this month following a juror medical emergency and a dispute over late gun evidence disclosures, Hoodline reported in coverage of the Hammond murder trial's collapse. That case stemmed from a 2022 fatal shooting in Hammond. For now, the Lowell strip mall shooting remains under investigation, with state police maintaining that the scene is secure and no threat to the public persists.
