Man critically injured in daylight shooting in Mississauga was victim of attempted robbery: police

A man has been rushed to hospital in critical condition following a shooting near Derry Rd. and Cardiff Blvd. in Mississauga on Thursday. The suspect fled.

Peel police say they believe robbery was the motive for a daylight shooting at a Mississauga plaza that left one man critically injured on Thursday morning.

Officers were called to Derry Road and Cardiff Boulevard at around 11 a.m. for reports of gunfire in the area.

When they arrived on scene, they found a man suffering from multiple gunshot wounds in the parking lot of a commercial plaza.

The man was rushed to a trauma centre in life-threatening condition and has undergone emergency surgery, Const. Tyler Bell told reporters at the scene on Thursday afternoon.

According to police, it appears the victim and a woman arrived at the plaza in a black Cadillac Escalade. When the woman exited the vehicle, Bell said, she was involved in an altercation with three suspects who were armed with a firearm and baseball bat.

“The working theory right now is that some sort of an altercation happened between the suspects and the female that was in this vehicle and the male that was shot exited in an attempt to intervene,” Bell said.

It is unclear if the suspects and victim knew each other prior to the shooting but Bell said police believe it was a targeted incident.

“We are satisfied that this is not a random incident and we believe it to be a robbery attempt at this point,” he added.

Police could not confirm if anything was stolen from the victim or the woman he arrived with at the plaza.

The suspects, Bell said, were seen fleeing the area in a black Jeep Wrangler.

He noted that police still need to review security footage to piece together exactly what transpired.

“There is a lot of preliminary information we are trying to sift through at this point,” Bell said.