A man was shot late Wednesday night in Westmont, and investigators still aren't sure whether the wound was accidental or whether someone else pulled the trigger. The gunfire rang out just before 11:20 p.m. near South Wilton Place and West 102nd Street, sending the victim to the hospital with stable vital signs.
According to MyNewsLA.com, Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies responded after a gunshot rang out at 11:17 p.m. Wednesday from an apartment on South Wilton Place at West 102nd Street. Paramedics took the victim to a hospital, where he had stable vital signs, the outlet reported.
Detectives opened a formal investigation into the shooting Friday, two days after the gunfire was first reported. Per the same account, deputies were still trying to determine whether the gunshot wound was accidental or whether suspects were involved — a distinction that remains unresolved as the case continues.
Few Details Released as Investigation Continues
The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department has not released additional details beyond the basics of the shooting, citing the ongoing nature of the investigation. No information about the victim's identity, age, or the full extent of his injuries has been made public. Investigators have not said whether anyone else was involved in the shooting.
Separate shootings have also been reported in the Westmont area of South Los Angeles, though the circumstances in each case differ. In a separate case, NBC Los Angeles reported that a man died after being shot by Los Angeles Police Department officers in Westmont, in an incident police said was connected to an earlier shooting of a man found with gunshot wounds at a gas station near the 11500 block of South Vermont Avenue. Investigators identified the man killed by officers as Eliar Real Hernandez and said they recovered a loaded 9-millimeter ghost gun in his possession; police said no officers or other people were hurt in that shooting.
A Separate Fatal Shooting Nearby
In another Westmont-area case, CBS News Los Angeles reported that a woman was shot to death after deputies were sent to the 2000 block of Century Boulevard at around 12:40 a.m. She was found inside a car that had crashed into a concrete foundation in an alley south of Century Boulevard and was pronounced dead at the scene. The Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner later identified her as 21-year-old Lanai Dees, and the sheriff's department assumed the investigation because the shooting happened in the unincorporated community of Westmont.
Those cases remain distinct from Wednesday's shooting, for which investigators are still determining whether suspects were involved and whether the wound was self-inflicted or caused by someone else. Detectives continue piecing together what happened in the South Wilton Place shooting.
