Police arrest 2 men in fatal Oklahoma shooting spree

Police arrested two white men who they believe are responsible for a shooting spree that claimed three lives and injured two people in the city of Tulsa, Oklahoma. A police department official told AFP that the suspects taken into custody in a neighborhood just north of Tulsa were identified as Jake England, 19, and Alvin Watts, 32. The two suspects were found together in a neighborhood near where the shootings occurred after police received several anonymous tips that England was the shooter, The Tulsa World newspaper reported. All three fatalities -- identified as Dannaer Fields, 49, Bobby Clark, 54 and William Allen, 31 -- were black men. Two other men were wounded, but are expected to survive, the paper noted. They have not been identified. "It is way too early to call this a hate crime," Federal Bureau of Investigation agent James Finch said Sunday at a news conference. "We have yet to analyze all the information to understand the motivations in this case. "This is where we can't afford to make mistakes," he added. Meanwhile, Tulsa police Chief Chuck Jordan called the attacks vicious and cowardly and said his agency was going to do whatever it takes to apprehend anyone involved. "Our sympathy goes out to the families of the victims and we hope that our efforts can bring some resolution and closure to these heinous acts," police said in a news release Sunday. But while some community leaders insisted the shootings had been racially-motivated, Jordan said there was no evidence of that yet. Court records showed that the two men have been charged with three counts each of first degree murder, along with weapons charges. A task force taking part in the manhunt following the shooting included officials from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the US Marshals Service. The Tulsa shooting came amid another racially-charged case that involves an unarmed black teen shot dead by a neighborhood watch guard in February. Neighborhood watch captain George Zimmerman, a white Hispanic, fatally shot 17-year-old Trayvon Martin inside a gated community in the Florida town of Sanford on February 26. Zimmerman has said he acted in self-defense after Martin punched him in the nose, knocked him down and slammed his head against the concrete. The case has unleashed a national uproar over race relations and the right to self-defense in the United States. Since Martin's death, there have been numerous large public protests calling for Zimmerman's arrest, but there have been no detention orders and the 28-year-old has gone into hiding, fearing for his life.