Suspect charged in highway shootings near Kansas City

Kansas City, Mo., authorities announced Friday charges against a Kansas City-area man suspected in connection with about a dozen recent highway shootings that have wounded three people.

The shootings frazzled the community, evoking memories of past serial attacks, like a series of shootings on Ohio highways in 2003 and the Washington, D.C., sniper attacks of 2002.

Jackson County prosecutor Jean Peters Baker said at a news conference that 27-year-old Mohammed Whitaker of Grandview has been charged with 18 felony counts and is being held on $1 million bail. Baker said Whitaker was charged with two counts of shooting into a motor vehicle and injuring a person, seven counts of shooting into a motor vehicle and nine counts of armed criminal action.

At least six of the shootings occurred near Grandview. The Kansas City suburb is home to an area known as the Grandview Triangle, where three interstates and U.S. 50 intersect.

Other shootings were reported in the Missouri suburbs of Blue Springs and Lee's Summit and Leawood, Kan. Two of the wounded drivers were shot in the leg, and the third was shot in the arm. None of their wounds were considered life-threatening.

The last confirmed shooting believed to be connected to the case was reported April 6, about a month after the shootings began.

Whitaker was taken into custody Thursday from a home near Interstate 49, one of the highways that intersects at the Grandview Triangle. Police also confiscated a dark green Dodge Neon.

Police first thought that many of the shootings on Kansas City’s highways were random, but two weeks ago began grouping some of the shootings together. Late last week, police said they had connected a dozen of the shootings to the same person. On Friday they said surveillance footage showed Whitaker in his car, following several cars in their blind-spots on the highway.  

Police did not say what led them to the suspect, but have said they received more than 100 tips. A reward of up to $10,000 was offered for information leading to an arrest. Police haven't said if anyone will be claiming the reward money.

Al Jazeera and wire services