Two Palm Beach security officers shot
Palm Beach FL May 1 2018 Only eight hours had passed since the nightclub next door was the scene of a fatal shooting that left three others injured, and church was about to start.
Allen Mortin, a deacon at Living Word Christian Community, wanted the parishioners to feel safe while they walked in so he stood outside, acting more like a security officer.
He greeted everyone.
Inside the nightclub La Isla Del Encanto at 1969 S. Military Trail in suburban West Palm Beach. It was the site of five shootings, one of which was fatal. (Melanie Bell / Palm Beach Post)
“I just want to make sure everybody feels safe to come to church,” Mortin said before the 10:30 a.m. service.
Next door a cleaning crew sat inside of the La Isla Del Encanto nightclub.
Inside, two pink birthday balloons were tied to the bar. The chairs at the tables were decorated in white fabric with blue and red ribbons tied around the back. The crime scene tape, crumbled up, had already been moved into the trash outside.
The shooting happened at about 2:30 a.m. at the nightclub in the West Palm Plaza at South Military Trail and Forest Hill Boulevard. Four people were shot, including two security officers. One person died, Palm Beach County Sheriff’s spokesman Eric Davis said.
The names of the victims hadn’t been released by late Sunday afternoon.
The security officers did not fire their guns, Davis said. He did not say whether the shooting happened inside or outside.
The homicide is Palm Beach County’s 27th of the year, and the 18th involving a shooting, according to a Palm Beach Post database.
According to the database, two other homicides have happened nearby. Amanda Lee DeJesus, a 17-year-old Lake Worth High School student, was killed in the parking lot of the now-closed El Toro Loco nightclub at 1999 S. Military Trail in June 2010. The club was in the same plaza as the current La Isla Del Encanto.
In January 2014, Luis Gonzalez, a 38-year-old from Wellington, was shot and killed in a dispute at the Doctor’s Choice Medical Center on Forest Hill Boulevard — within walking distance of La Isla Del Encanto — while Ana Villa, 49, was injured. The man who killed Gonzalez, 69-year-old Jose Vega, then turned the gun and killed himself.
Inside the nightclub La Isla Del Encanto at 1969 S. Military Trail in suburban West Palm Beach. It was the site of five shootings, one of which was fatal. (Melanie Bell / Palm Beach Post)
Mortin said a crime like this hasn’t happened in the two years he’s been there. While he expects there to be some problems associated with the club because of its late hours, he never expected a mass shooting.
“Any crowd that stays out until 5 in the morning, there’s always going to be something, but you hope it’s just a little fight and it gets dispersed and everybody goes home,” he said.
Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1 (800) 458-TIPS or Det. Milliner at (561) 688-4003.
