Man shot, killed in neighborhood behind Modesto’s Memorial Medical Center

A man was shot and killed Friday night in a neighborhood just east of Modesto’s Memorial Medical Center.

At 7:40 p.m., police were called to Ortega Drive and Galvez Avenue on a report of gunfire and a man down in front of a house, according to Heather Graves, spokeswoman for the Modesto Police Department.

When officers arrived, they found the man, who was suffering from a gunshot wound. He was taken to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead, Graves said.

She said a witness heard the gunfire and a woman scream. The man collapsed in front of a home on the southeast corner of Ortega and Galvez, which is just northeast of the Briggsmore Avenue and Coffee Road intersection.

As of Saturday afternoon, there was nobody in custody.

Police seemed to be focusing their attention on a house in the 1600 block of Ortega on the west side of the street.

A few neighbors said they thought there might have been a suspect in the house at one point. But Graves did not have any information on a suspect or details of efforts after the shooting to find the person responsible.

Multiple squad cars and officers remained until some began leaving about 9:30 p.m.

A short while later, the department’s crime scene truck showed up, and officers moved the crime scene tape on Ortega, which had been at Galvez, a block north to Montecito Avenue as detectives began their investigation.

Down the street from where the victim’s body was found, some people said they didn’t hear anything until police converged on the scene.

It is the first reported homicide in Stanislaus County in 2017. In January 2016, there were five homicides, including two investigated by the Modesto Police Department.

This story was originally published January 27, 2017 at 8:16 PM with the headline "Man shot, killed in neighborhood behind Modesto’s Memorial Medical Center."