One man is dead and a second man is fighting for his life after a shooting on East 120th Street in Cleveland prompted a heavy police response and shut down the street early Monday. Cleveland EMS confirmed the man found at the scene had died, while a second man, believed to be in his 30s, was rushed to a hospital in critical condition.
According to News 5 Cleveland, Cleveland EMS responded to a shooting on East 120th Street and found one man dead at the scene. A second man in his 30s was transported to University Hospitals, where he remained in critical condition, per the same account from paramedics.
Cleveland police maintained a large presence at the intersection of East 120th Street and Miles Avenue as the investigation unfolded, the station reported. A News 5 crew at the scene confirmed that East 120th Street was closed off while officers worked the area, and the story remained developing as of early Monday.
No Word Yet on What Led to the Shooting
Details about what sparked the gunfire, who was involved, or whether anyone has been taken into custody have not been released. The circumstances surrounding the shooting, along with the identities of the men involved, remain unknown at this stage of the investigation.
East 120th Street has seen repeated violence in recent months. Hoodline previously reported on a four-hour standoff that ended in tragedy after 20-year-old Ke'Yon Sanchez Moore shot himself inside a home in the 3500 block of the street, a confrontation that began when U.S. Marshals arrived to arrest him on an aggravated robbery warrant.
A Mixed Picture in Citywide Crime Data
The shooting comes as Cleveland's violent crime statistics have told an uneven story through 2026. Homicides climbed from 19 to 25 in the first quarter of the year, a jump of more than 30% compared with the same stretch of 2025, according to Axios Cleveland, which drew on quarterly reports from 67 of the largest U.S. law enforcement agencies. Aggravated assaults rose by more than 20% over that same period, even as rapes and robberies fell by around 20%.
By midyear, the trend had leveled out. Cleveland logged 48 homicides through June, identical to the first half of 2025, the outlet's later report noted, with rapes and robberies declining slightly while aggravated assaults ticked up. Citywide, those numbers moved against a broader national trend, as homicides across the major cities surveyed by the Major Cities Chiefs Association fell 17.2% over the same six-month span.
Zooming out further, Cleveland's 2025 totals still reflected a multi-year decline. Detectives investigated 118 homicides that year, down nearly 8% from 128 the year before, according to cleveland.com, while Cuyahoga County as a whole recorded 166 homicides, down nearly 7% from 178 in 2024. Police leaders have cautioned, per Axios Cleveland, that crime trends can shift quickly heading into the warmer months, when violence has historically risen.
Other Recent Violence Near the Same Corridor
The East 120th Street corridor has been the site of multiple violent incidents this year. In September, a Cleveland man named Jaylan Craig was fatally shot on Forest Avenue near East 120th Street, found with multiple gunshot wounds around 11:35 p.m., cleveland.com reported. Craig was pronounced dead at the scene, and a 19-year-old suspect was arrested after officers, responding to a ShotSpotter alert, pursued his vehicle to a crash near East 116th Street and Kinsman Avenue.
A separate shooting and crash near East 120th Street and Minor Avenue happened around 10:30 p.m., according to a News 5 Cleveland report, in which a driver was shot multiple times and later died at a hospital. It remained unknown whether any arrests had been made in that case, the station noted. Cleveland has two Level 1 trauma centers, MetroHealth Medical Center and University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center, that treat the city's most critical trauma cases, per cleveland.com.
This remains an active and developing story, and no additional details about the cause of Monday's shooting or the identities of those involved have been released.
