Toddler escapes deadly shooting
2007-08-30 13:57
London - British police are hunting two suspects on Thursday after three men were shot dead at a suburban house in an attack from which a three-year-old girl escaped unhurt.
Father and son Keith and Matthew Cowell, aged 52 and 17, and an unnamed 33-year-old man were killed in the shooting on Tuesday night in the commuter town of Bishop's Stortford, 56km north of London.
Two women aged 54 and 23 were seriously injured and are being treated in hospital for gunshot wounds.
Police described the killings as "disturbing but targeted".
Officers said they want to question two men of Asian origin in their late teens seen in the area just after the attack.
Police and local officials have tried to play down any suggestion that the shooting represented the spread of gun culture from the inner cities to the suburbs.
"I want to reassure people this is not normal for the area and they shouldn't be afraid," said local councillor John Barfoot.
"I don't think gang crime has moved to the area. This is out of the blue."
The shooting of 11-year-old Rhys Jones in Liverpool, north-west England, last week has pushed fears over firearms up the political agenda and prompted Prime Minister Gordon Brown's government to pledge to be tough on crime.
- AFP