Law enforcement authorities were searching on Monday night for one of two gunmen who they allege opened fire on a Forest Hill car wash bay, killing a North Texas rapper and his 5-year-old daughter.
A judge signed a capital murder warrant for the suspect, whose name police declined to release.
A family member identified the victims as Chuckie Smith, known as G$ Lil Ronnie, and his daughter.
Two males wearing blue jeans and gray sweaters about 10:45 a.m. left a white four-door Kia, approached Smith’s vehicle parked in a bay, and shot the father and child to death, Forest Hill police said.
Police suggested they had not identified the second suspect.
Forest Hill Police Chief David Hernandez did not respond to questions from a reporter on whether a surveillance camera at the business recorded the shooting or the suspects arriving or fleeing and on whether ejected cartridge casings were recovered at the scene.
Smith’s aunt Stella Houston told reporters that Smith was cleaning out his car when “somebody came through shooting and killed him and the baby.”
“He was a family man and he was going around rapping, OK?” Houston said. “Why would you target him? … He didn’t bother nobody. And a baby? His baby?”
A spokesperson with the MedStar ambulance service confirmed that two people were dead after 911 callers reported gunshots at Slappy’s Express Car Wash, at 6500 Forest Hill Drive.
A crowd including family members and friends of Smith, who was 30, gathered Monday afternoon at the car wash, where ambulances, Forest Hill police officers, Fort Worth police and firefighters, the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office and other law enforcement agencies responded.
The Texas Rangers are leading the investigation.
Crime-scene tape and dozens of evidence markers dotted the scene.
People gather Monday afternoon, March 3, at Slappy’s Car Wash, at 6500 Forest Hill Drive, where ambulances, Forest Hill police officers, Fort Worth police and firefighters, and the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office responded to a fatal shooting.
This is the third fatal shooting in less than two weeks in the city, a suburb south of Fort Worth with a population of about 14,000 people.
On Feb. 21, a former employee shot and killed two men at a car dealership, RK Auto Sales, on Mansfield Highway, police have said.
On the night of Feb. 22, a 36-year-old woman was killed in the back yard of her home when a stray bullet hit her. Police have not announced an arrest in that case.
A Slappy’s Car Wash spokesperson wrote in a statement distributed to the press that the company’s employees would be praying for the victims and their families.
“We are shocked, appalled and deeply troubled by the senseless and violent events that occurred today. Right now, there are more questions than answers,” the spokesperson wrote.
Anyone with information about the killings or the suspects’ whereabouts can call the Forest Hill Police Department at 817-531-5250 or email [email protected].
People gather Monday afternoon, March 3, at Slappy’s Car Wash, at 6500 Forest Hill Drive, where ambulances, Forest Hill police officers, Fort Worth police and firefighters, and the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office responded to a fatal shooting.
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