Gunfire wounded four people at a small shopping plaza in Hawthorne, Calif., early Thursday, Sept. 24, 2026, police said. Bullets struck at least three of them.
The shooting happened in the 14100 block of Crenshaw Boulevard, in the intersection area of Crenshaw Boulevard and Rosecrans Avenue. A Hawthorne Police Department spokesperson said the report came in around 2:13 a.m. Officers went to the plaza after a caller reported gunshots and screaming in the area.
The shooter or shooters had already fled before the first patrol cars arrived, according to Hawthorne police. All four injuries were non-life-threatening, police said.
A Scattered Crime Scene
The scene was scattered rather than contained. Three wounded adults were spread out across the property — in separate parking lots and one near a bus stop bench. At least one victim appeared conscious as first responders lifted the person onto a stretcher. Footage recorded at the strip mall showed firefighters and paramedics crouched over an injured man.
The Los Angeles County Fire Department took three victims — two men and a woman, all treated first at the scene — to local hospitals. A fourth victim, a man, reached a hospital on his own and was identified there afterward, police said. Police described the victims only as three men and a woman.
A neighborhood resident posted video on the Citizen app that captured the sound of the attack. Screams are audible on the recording, along with at least three distinct bursts of gunfire, and at least 10 shots can be counted across roughly a minute of footage.
Investigators found a number of spent shell casings strewn across the roadway. Officers searched a car sitting in the parking lot, then had it towed for evidence.
What Set Off the Gunfire
Witnesses said a group of people had gathered near the intersection of Crenshaw Boulevard and Rosecrans Avenue and fell into an argument shortly before the shooting started. Police have not confirmed those witness descriptions of an argument. Investigators had not publicly confirmed the motive or the circumstances as of Thursday morning, and the case remained under investigation.
Police announced no arrests, and officers had taken nobody into custody as of Thursday morning. The department has released no suspect descriptions and has not said how many people may have been involved. Police confirmed that no officer fired a weapon during the incident.
Three Departments on Scene
Officers from three police departments responded in a large, multi-agency emergency response. Officers from the Gardena and Hermosa Beach police departments came to the plaza alongside county firefighters and paramedics.
The Hawthorne Police Department shut down Crenshaw Boulevard between Rosecrans Avenue and El Segundo Boulevard on Thursday morning during its investigation. The street is a busy north-south artery. Several businesses nearby would remain closed for as long as officers stayed on scene.
A South Bay Commercial Pocket
The area is a commercial pocket of Los Angeles County’s South Bay region, lined with storefronts and parking lots. Hawthorne is a city of roughly 6 square miles, wedged between Inglewood and the beach cities, along one of the South Bay’s main commercial corridors.
The intersection where the shooting happened serves as a transit stop as well as a shopping destination, a point underscored by the bus bench where one of the wounded was found. At that hour, the plaza’s businesses would have been closed, leaving the parking lots and the sidewalk outside them as the scene of the gunfire.
Hawthorne Police Department work on the case continued Thursday morning, with the search for those responsible still open and the block of Crenshaw Boulevard where the shooting happened closed to traffic.