BILLINGS – An apparent fight among three men in a pickup truck ended with two of the men being shot to death and a third hospitalized with severe trauma to his neck, Billings police said.
Officers responded to a report that a pickup truck crashed into a tree after 3 a.m. and two men were found dead of gunshot wounds inside the vehicle, Lt. Brandon Wooley said. The injured man was taken to the hospital. His injuries were not consistent with having been caused by the crash, Wooley said.
Bullet holes could be seen in the pickup truck’s driver’s side window and door, The Billings Gazette reported.
A preliminary investigation indicated a fight broke out inside the vehicle prior to the crash. Officials are not searching for anyone else in connection to the shooting, Wooley said.
The names of the victims nave not been released, but they appeared to be in their 20s, Wooley said. The injured man is 22.
Tuesday’s deaths bring to 10 the number of people who have died in shootings in Montana this month, including a 15-year-old boy who was fatally shot in Billings on Jan. 16.
The other shooting deaths this month include a man in Great Falls on Jan. 5, a man near Rimini on Jan. 12, two brothers in Three Forks on Jan. 16, a Kalispell man on Jan. 17, and a homicide-suicide near Big Arm on Jan. 19.