A driver traveling in the Los Gatos-San Jose area said his vehicle was shot at Tuesday night, marking the third reported freeway shooting in the South Bay this week.
The driver told authorities that he was traveling from southbound Highway 17 to southbound Highway 85 when he heard a thud, according to the California Highway Patrol. When the driver got home and inspected his car, he found what appeared to be a bullet hole.
Also on Tuesday night, the CHP responded to a reported shooting on Interstate 680 in San Jose that left a 12-year-old girl with injuries from shattered glass created by the gunshot.
Late Monday night, a 33-year-old man was shot and killed on I-680 in Milpitas.
At first, the three South Bay shootings didn’t seem to have much in common. The Monday night shooting that took the life of 30-year old Matthew Rios was certainly the most violent, and his mother said her son told her by phone he was being followed.
"Chasing him all the way down to Crowley to Landess and got him on the front," Madonna Simmons said. "It was just one more exit, and he would have been home."
The shooting at 680 and King Road Tuesday night resulted in a bullet going through the car and the girl hurt by the crashing glass.
The CHP said Wednesday the girl’s mother says she pulled over when she saw a passenger in a "white car" brandishing a black firearm. And that the white car waited for her to pull out before firing.
"It looks as though this was an isolated and potentially targeted incident," CHP spokesman Officer Ross Lee said, meaning the suspect was interested only in that one vehicle.
Lee said the Highway 17-85 shooting Tuesday night may be a road rage incident. It’s still being investigated. But Lee added there’s potentially valuable evidence: a bullet was recovered.
