Argument leads to deadly shooting at College Park motel, cops say

An argument among three people at a College Park motel left a man dead Monday morning after it escalated to gunfire, police said.

The victim was fatally wounded and found in the back parking lot when College Park police responded to the Super 8 motel on Old National Highway shortly before 6 a.m. According to investigators, the man argued with another man and a woman moments before the shooting.

“The unidentified armed gunman and female were observed fleeing from the location after the shooting in an older model SUV,” Lt. O. Manning said in a news release. “They were gone before officers arrived.”

The victim, later identified as 37-year-old Kenneth Holmes, was pronounced dead at the scene. At the edge of the parking lot, about 35 yards from the man’s body, police placed at least two dozen evidence markers along the ground near a wood line.

College Park police mark evidence at the edge of a parking lot near a wood line outside the Super 8 motel on Old National Highway.

It was not clear if Holmes was a guest of the motel, but investigators appeared to focus their efforts on a third-floor room Monday morning.

“Witnesses were interviewed,” Manning said. “Detectives are in their early stages of the investigation and are pursuing leads to identify the gunman and woman involved.”