A tourist from the US mainland who was visiting Puerto Rico for Bad Bunny's residency was fatally shot early Sunday at La Perla, a popular seaside shantytown, police said, per the AP. The victim was identified as Kevin Mares, a 25-year-old who lived in New York, according to a police statement. The shooting happened in the predawn hours at a nightspot called "Refuge for Mistreated Men" in La Perla, a coastal community that has struggled to shed its dark reputation. It once served as Puerto Rico's biggest distribution point for heroin and was known for its violence before a 2011 police raid.
Homicide detective Sgt. Arnaldo Ruiz said in a phone interview that the shooting took place at 4:13am when several people near Mares began arguing and one pulled out a gun and shot at least three people, including Mares. A brother and a sister in their mid-40s who live in La Perla were injured and remain hospitalized. Ruiz said Mares was an innocent bystander. He was with three other friends from New York who told police they were in Puerto Rico for one of Bad Bunny's 30 concerts, which have attracted tens of thousands of visitors to the US territory. Mares was shot on the left side of his abdomen and was taken to Puerto Rico's largest public hospital, where he died, authorities said.
Ruiz said police don't yet know what the people were arguing about and don't have a description of the shooter. "We have very little information," he said. San Juan Mayor Miguel Romero told reporters Sunday that he would share footage from security cameras in the area. Though the situation in La Perla have eased in recent years, isolated violence persists. In February 2023, three tourists were stabbed after police said a person told them to stop filming inside the community. Then in April 2024, a 24-year-old tourist from Delaware was killed after police said he and a friend were attacked for trying to take pictures of La Perla following a drug purchase.
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