Man shoots woman and 3 children, then himself, at Las Vegas apartment complex, police say

Las Vegas police investigate the scene of a shooting at a northwest valley apartment complex, Monday, Dec. 11, 2023 in Las Vegas. (Bizuayehu Tesfaye/Las Vegas Review-Journal via AP)

LAS VEGAS -

A man shot and killed a woman and two children and critically wounded a third child Monday before fatally shooting himself at a Las Vegas apartment complex, authorities said.

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What police described as a murder-suicide took place just five days after three professors were fatally shot by a lone gunman at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

"It does not have to end like this," police homicide Lt. Robert Price told reporters outside the sprawling apartment complex where he said the man, woman and children were discovered about 10 a.m. by the man's brother.

Price did not immediately identify the man, who he said had been under house arrest in an unspecified court case. He said police also don't yet know if the shooter and his victims were related.

The shootings happened at an apartment complex about a 40-minute drive northwest of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, where a lone gunman walked onto campus last week and opened fire in a building housing the business school, killing three faculty members and critically wounding a fourth.

Police identified that shooter as Anthony Polito, a longtime business professor in North Carolina who officials said was turned down for a teaching job at UNLV and other Nevada colleges and universities. Polito was killed during a shootout with university police.

The Wednesday shooting and police response stoked fear on the 30,000-student campus located not far from the Las Vegas Strip, where a gunman opened fire at an outdoor concert in October 2017, killing 58 people. Two people who survived later died. It was the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.