California shooter: Police launch manhunt after drivers shot at in random attacks

Seemingly random shootings occur during morning and evening commutes

Authorities believe the victims were randomly chosen (Fresno County Sheriff’s Department)

Police in California have launched a manhunt after a rash of seemingly random shootings targeting vehicles during the morning and evening commutes.

Sheriff’s officials in the state’s sprawling agricultural heartland say they’ve received 10 different reports in the last week of drivers being sprayed with bullets since the end of November.

No one has yet been killed and only one person has been injured – likely by shrapnel. But Fresno County Sheriff Margaret Mims warned that, given the frequency of the shootings, “if this keeps going, it’s going to be a matter of time before we have a murder investigation”.

All of the shootings have occurred over several square miles on the outskirts of the city of Kerman, a rural community of some 14,000 people, and they bear a common pattern: During morning or evening commuting hours, drivers joining the flow of people to or from work hear shots as another car rushes past in the other direction.

“We have not determined what a motive is or could be for these shootings,” Ms Mims said. “They all appear to be completely random.

“This is a cowardly act,” she added.

Based on first-hand accounts from victims, authorities have pieced together a description of the suspected vehicle. They are on the lookout for a dark-coloured pick-up truck with oversized tyres.

As they work to solve the apparently arbitrary shootings, authorities have increased the reward for leads to $3,000 (£2,240). The search has marshalled sheriff’s offices in two counties and members of the California Highway Patrol.

Efforts to gather useful information have been stymied so far by a tendency of affected drivers to wait until they get home from their commutes, Ms Mims said, or in some cases longer. She urged anyone whose car is fired on to contact authorities swiftly.

“What I’m asking the public to do is if this happens to you, to get to a place of safety first and then call 911 and let us know as soon as possible that this has happened,” Ms Mims said.

She asked people to stay alert to the possibility that they could be affected.

“As vehicles pass each other is when these shootings are occurring, and many times the victims think maybe another vehicle has thrown up a rock,” she said. “However, we’re asking that you think twice about that and it could be something more”.

Road shootings have plagued other communities over the years. A series of incidents known as the I-10 shootings unfolded on highways around Phoenix, Arizona, in 2015, with numerous vehicles incurring bullet damage. A suspect was named but charges were later dropped.

A string of shootings in the Washington DC area in 2002 had more deadly results. Ten people died and three suffered critical injuries as John Allen Muhammad and his teenage accomplice, Lee Boyd Malvo, opened fire on cars, terrifying the region and injecting danger into simple acts like stopping at a petrol station.

Muhammad was ultimately executed. Earlier this year a federal judge threw out two life sentences handed to Malvo because he was a juvenile at the time of the crimes.