One dead, one critical in Des Moines shooting

A 17-year-old Des Moines man is dead and an 18-year-old is in critical condition after an overnight shooting in the capitol city. Sergeant Tony Severson, a spokesman for Des Moines police, says at 12:30 this morning, a blue van pulled up outside a Des Moines hospital. Two Latino men parked the van outside the hospital and ran. Two other Latino men were inside the van — one severely injured, the other fatally injured. Steverson says they don’t know the identities of the two men who fled the hospital parking lot. And they don’t know what motivated the shootings. Cops do know the shootings happened at a home on the southeast side of Des Moines. Steverson says they don’t know yet whether the shooting happened inside or outside the home. Police are still interviewing potential witnesses. He says the two men who were shot may have been affiliated with one of two gangs — the Sureno 13 or the Aztec Kings. Seventeen-year-old Rigoberto Quinones died of his wounds. Eighteen-year-old Jose Luis Ramos is in the hospital. Ramos is being treated for a gunshot wound to the upper torso, and Steverson says his condition is critical. Two young women who may have been witnesses to the shootings have been interviewed, but an investigator says it was a “hectic scenario” and the two women may have been “ducking and dodging” bullets themselves, so they haven’t provided much insight into what really happened. The two men who were shot have criminal records and each has spent time in the Polk County Jail. Quinones’ death is the 13th homicide in Des Moines this year.