No suspect in Forbes Avenue shooting

City police are still looking for the person responsible for shooting two men early Friday… City police are still looking for the person responsible for shooting two men early Friday morning in Central Oakland.

The shooting occurred at approximately 2:45 a.m. outside of the McDonald’s on Forbes Avenue between Atwood Street and Oakland Avenue.

Cmdr. Thomas Stangrecki, of major crimes for the city police, said police have not yet named an official suspect and no arrests have been made. He said witnesses described the shooter as a black man wearing a black hat.

“People don’t like to come forward,” said police spokesperson Diane Richard. “Some people are hesitant to cooperate with police.”

Richard said that no leads on the suspect have been gathered, citing individual fear of retaliation and intimidation as key factors that dissuade people from assisting police.

One of the victims indicated that he was in a fight earlier that night at the Sphinx Cafe Egyptian Hookah Bar at Bates and Atwood streets, said Stangrecki.

Police responded shortly thereafter, and a man who was hosting a party at the hookah bar told everyone to leave.

In addition to the altercation inside, there were also several fights outside of the hookah bar, and city police officers broke up a large crowd in front of the establishment around 1:20 a.m., said Stangrecki.

Later in the morning, the two victims were leaving McDonald’s on Forbes Avenue when another customer followed them outside and shot them, said Stangrecki.

After the shooting, police said the two victims ran from the McDonald’s to the Original Hot Dog Shop a few blocks away at Forbes and Bouquet Street, where they collapsed.

They were rushed to UPMC Presbyterian Hospital, where one of the victims was in critical condition and the other was in serious condition.

The victims were a 21-year-old from the North Side and a 22-year-old from Oakland, said Stangrecki.

Neither of the victims were Pitt students, said Delaney. There’s been no word on the conditions of the victims.

Increased police presence

In the wake of increased criminal activity, city police and Pitt police have partnered in an effort to halt crime in Oakland.

An “Impact Squad,” devised by city police Chief Nate Harper and Pitt police Chief Tim Delaney and implemented after the shooting, added two officers and one supervisor from both the city and University squads to patrol the streets of Oakland.

The officers will be in areas where crime and nuisance tend to be a problem and work in tandem with the regularly scheduled officers for those areas, said Delaney.

The same tactic was used in the past to combat waves of criminal activity in Oakland.

“We used this tactic years ago in the 1980s,” said Delaney.

He attributes some crime to Oakland for the convenience of its late-night restaurants, which are appealing to the after-club crowd.