Two men were fatally shot early Sunday morning in the SoHo area after an altercation between two groups of people, according to the Tampa Police Department.
The victims have been identified as 28-year-old Kenneth Washington and 23-year-old Kevon Christmas.
A third shooting victim remains hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries.
At approximately 2:57 a.m., officers on patrol in SoHo heard shots fired and responded to a parking lot on the 500 block of South Howard. Officers assigned to the SoHo area were already in the area at the time as they were assigned to crowd dispersal.
Based on the preliminary investigation, the three victims knew each other and had previously interacted with one another, according to Tampa police officials.
Prior to the shooting, the trio were in a dispute that escalated. They were taken to an area hospital, where Washington and Christmas were later pronounced dead.
Police detectives are working to identify the suspect involved in the shooting.
"My thoughts are with the loved ones impacted by this violence, especially on a day like today," said Tampa Police Chief Lee Bercaw. "Our officers, detectives, and crime scene technicians have been working tirelessly to gather any available evidence and leads in this case."
You may remember our in-depth reporting just last weekend where TPD told us they've increased their presence to keep up with the amount of people flocking to SoHo.
While TPD said calls for service are up it told ABC Action News that crime, is not.
"We have not seen an increase in crime, even though we've seen an increase in citizens coming down to SoHo, there's been no increase in crime from what we've seen," Lt. Carlos Houston said.
This deadly shooting on Mother's Day weekend paints a different picture for some.
"It's a bit scary. It seems like gun violence is just more and more prone to happen," Roland Nagy explained.
We first met Roland Nagy, the manager of Fine Ink SoHo earlier this month when he told us he welcomed the extra foot traffic as it brings in more business. But, seeing forensic units driving into work has him on high alert.
"That was a bit tough to stomach and, I mean, it's definitely something that I already talked about to the owner before, you know, as part of possibly having to, if I could bring my weapon to work just to make sure that if anything like that were to happen in our business that we could protect ourselves," Nagy explained.
Nagy said he wants to open up the conversation with his colleagues to see what they can continue to do to stay safe.
"I'm not too worried about our business because a lot of our stuff gets done during the day, and I feel much like Ybor, this area is really safe during the day. It's just at night after people have been drinking they get a bit more antsy a bit more prone to violence I suppose," Nagy said.
He said he hopes people will put the guns down and just let things go.
"Take that on the chin and just go because it's not really worth getting into an altercation with someone that might end in gun violence," Nagy said.
There were no reports of injuries to officers or other bystanders in the area.
Anyone with information that could assist detectives is encouraged to call the Tampa Police Department at 813-231-6130 or submit an anonymous tip via Crime
Stoppers of Tampa Bay at 800-873-8477 or by texting SAFETAMPA to Tip411 (847411).
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