Anchorage police say the deaths of four people shot over the past week, including a man found Sunday in Spenard, have pushed the city’s count of homicides this year to a grim milestone.
According to a police statement, officers responded at about 1:45 p.m. Sunday to reports of an unconscious man on the 3700 block of McCain Loop, off Spenard Road near Minnesota Drive. They found 36-year-old Joseph Siafanua unresponsive with a gunshot wound to his upper body. Medics declared him dead at the scene.
Officers are also investigating the death of a woman found shot just before noon Thursday on the 300 block of East Northern Lights Boulevard, along a dense Midtown business corridor. Medics responded, but she also died at the scene. Her body was sent to the state medical examiner’s office to determine her cause of death.
Police spokeswoman Shelly Wozniak said Monday that Siafanua’s death is “believed to be an isolated incident and not at random.” She also said his shooting marks Anchorage’s 30th homicide of 2024, with more than two months remaining in the year.
According to the Anchorage Daily News, 2017 saw the city’s record number of homicides at 37, which fell to 28 the following year.
Wozniak declined to answer questions Monday about the woman’s death. Police said Friday that “no public safety threat” was related to the incident.
Two separate shootings in East Anchorage on Tuesday that left a 16-year-old boy and an unnamed man dead also remain under investigation.Police are asking anyone with information about any of the shootings, including surveillance video, to call them at 311. Tips can also be submitted anonymously online though Anchorage Crime Stoppers.
Chris Klint is a web producer and breaking news reporter at Alaska Public Media. Reach him at cklint@alaskapublic.org. Read more about Chris here.
