The shootings appear to follow robberies or attempted robberies at the four convenience stores on July 11, or 7/11 — a day when national brand 7-Eleven celebrates its 95th birthday by giving away free Slurpee drinks. “Our hearts go out to the victims and their loved ones,” 7-Eleven, Inc. said in a statement. “We are gathering information about this terrible tragedy and are cooperating with local law enforcement.” It was not immediately clear to investigators what led to the shootings in the cities of Riverside, Santa Ana, Brea and La Habra or why the violence occurred on July 11. “I think the only person who would answer that would be the suspect,” said Officer Ryan Railsback, a spokesman for the Riverside Police Department, where the first shooting occurred about 1:50 a.m. “There’s no way it’s a coincidence. it’s 7-Eleven, July 11th.” The shooting in Riverside left the victim in critical condition, and while the shooting has not been officially linked to the others, Railsback said, “they all look very, very similar.” The cases seemed odd, Railsback said, because criminals typically know that convenience store robberies rarely yield large sums of money, especially at night. “If you go visit a liquor store or a 7-Eleven or a fast food place, you’re not going to make a lot of cash out of it,” he said. “It’s kind of weird that they would do that.” In the Riverside case, the gunman robbed the clerk and brandished a gun, then pointed the gun at a customer, opened fire and fled, Railsback said. Police believe the clerk handed over cash from the register. “There doesn’t appear to be any reason the suspect shot the customer,” Railsback said. “Sounds like the clerk gave him what he asked for.” The second shooting occurred around 3:20 a.m., about 24 miles (39 kilometers) away in Santa Ana, authorities said. Officers who responded to the reported shooting at a 7-Eleven in that city found a man dead in the parking lot with a gunshot wound to his upper torso, according to Sgt. Santa Ana Police spokeswoman Maria Lopez. The violence appeared to include robbery. “At this time, we do not believe he was an employee. We still don’t know what he was doing there in a parking lot, whether he was a potential customer or just passing through,” Lopez said. Surveillance video shows the suspect dropping items — believed to be the victim’s belongings — as he fled, Lopez said. Lopez said detectives believe the suspect in the Santa Ana killing is the same person who then traveled 12 miles (19.31 kilometers) to Brea, where a 7-Eleven employee was found shot to death about 4: 6 p.m. Brea Police Chief Phil Rodriguez said officers responded to a report of a man suffering from a gunshot wound and found the employee injured. He was later pronounced dead. “This appears to be a robbery turned homicide,” Rodriguez said. Surveillance photos, released to social media by Brea police, show a masked man wearing a black sweatshirt with a hood over his head. The sweatshirt had white lettering with green leaves on the front. Police declined to say what, if anything, was stolen from the Brea store or the victim — repeating only that the incident started as a robbery. Less than an hour later, officers in neighboring La Habra were dispatched to a reported robbery at a 7-Eleven. They discovered two gunshot victims around 4:55 a.m., according to Sgt. Sumner Bohee. The gunman had fled. Authorities have not released the condition of the victims. “We feel confident it’s the same suspect,” Rodriguez said.
