By Ian Ransom
SANTA CLARA, California, June 29 (Reuters) – A shooting in San Jose, California, that killed one person and injured another late on Sunday adjacent to a site used for World Cup watch parties was not related to the tournament, the city’s Mayor Matt Mahan said in a statement.
There were no World Cup games being screened at the San Pedro Square fan zone at the time of the shooting which police responded around 9:12 p.m. local time.
“This shooting happened near an area where families and fans have been gathering for our World Cup watch parties, and that makes the brazenness of this crime even more unacceptable,” Mahan said in a statement on Monday.
“I am grateful that Sunday’s programming had ended hours earlier, and there is no indication this violence was connected to the event.
“San Jose has safely welcomed hundreds of thousands of people downtown, and we are not going to let one criminal act scare our community away from public spaces that belong to them.”
Police said on Monday they responded to a report of the shooting in the area of North Market Street and West Santa Clara Street, in San Jose, and were investigating the incident as a homicide.
RAMEN RESTAURANT
Staff at a ramen restaurant about a block away from the fan zone confirmed to Reuters on Monday that a victim of the shooting had died metres from their door.
The other shooting victim ran through a car park and collapsed in the fan-zone outside bars where he was attended to by medics, a bar-tender who witnessed the scene told Reuters on Monday.
Security staff and police cleared San Pedro Square after the shooting and cordoned off the fan-zone.
On Monday morning, over 100 fans were watching the World Cup last-32 match between Japan and Brazil.
San Jose Police Department said in a statement they located an unconscious adult male victim lying on the sidewalk suffering from at least one gunshot wound.
“Officers immediately began life-saving measures and summoned medical personnel to the scene where they ultimately pronounced the victim deceased,” the statement said.
Polices said they located a second adult male shooting victim several yards away.
“Responding medical personnel transported the victim to a local hospital with life-threatening injuries where he has since been stabilised. He remains in critical condition but is expected to survive,” the statement said.
There are several dozen fan zones across the Bay Area.
(Reporting by Ian Ransom; Editing by Ed Osmond)
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