12-year-old girl killed, two wounded in Cleveland shopping center shooting

A 12-year-old girl was killed and two other people were wounded after gunfire erupted near Shopping City on South Street in Cleveland on Sunday afternoon, turning a busy retail corridor into a crime scene. The Cleveland Police Department said officers responded after multiple calls about shots fired near the Citi Trends and Dollar Tree stores.

The shooting happened in the Cleveland Shopping Center area, with Citi Trends listed at 415 South St. and Dollar Tree at 409 South Street. That places the violence in the middle of a commercial strip that draws families, shoppers and workers throughout the day, not in an isolated part of town. The girl died at the scene, while the two other victims were wounded.

Cleveland is a city of 11,199 people in the 2020 Census and one of the county seats of Bolivar County, which makes violence involving a child in a central shopping area especially immediate for residents who know the corridor well. South Street is part of the everyday route for errands and pickups in a city where major retail stops are woven into ordinary life.

Police have not announced a suspect, a motive or any arrests in the information released so far. The immediate response centered on the scene near Shopping City, where officers were sent after the first reports of shots fired and where investigators were left to sort out what happened in front of nearby businesses and passing traffic.

The killing adds another painful episode to a community that depends on places like Cleveland Shopping Center for routine needs. For families who shop near Citi Trends and Dollar Tree, the shooting shattered the sense that South Street is a place for errands, not emergency response, and left a child’s death at the center of a public safety crisis in the heart of Cleveland.