Wake Forest Police Fire Shots During Foot Chase, No Arrests Made

Officers fired shots inside Wake Forest's New Hope Village neighborhood Wednesday night after two people fled a police approach on foot, drawing a multi-agency response that swept through the residential area near 133 N. Allen Road and ended with a recovered gun but no one in custody.

The sequence began around 7 p.m. when a Wake Forest police officer attempted to approach a single person. That person ran. A second individual then also fled, and gunshots rang out shortly after the pursuit began, according to the Wake Forest Police Department. The department has not confirmed who fired, what threat the officer perceived, or whether any shell casings were recovered at a specific location in the neighborhood.

K9 officers and personnel from other law enforcement agencies joined the foot chase as it moved through the community. Despite the large response, neither suspect was apprehended. A gun was recovered somewhere in the search area, though police have not said whether it was directly connected to the shots fired. The department has not released a description of either suspect, identified the officer involved, or stated whether body camera footage exists and when it might be reviewed publicly. Residents have received no guidance on whether additional patrols will be deployed in New Hope Village in the days ahead.

This is the second significant law enforcement event in that community in less than two months. In February 2026, Wake Forest police responded to a disturbance call from a woman at New Hope Village Apartments at 133 N. Allen Road, a situation that escalated into a hostage standoff ending with a Raleigh man charged with kidnapping.

The back-to-back incidents land in a city whose crime numbers generally track below national norms. FBI data covering 2024 puts Wake Forest's rate at 14 crimes per 1,000 residents, and the citywide odds of becoming a victim of violent or property crime sit at 1 in 70. The city's overall crime rate of 26.47 falls below the national average of 33.37, and CrimeGrade.org assigns Wake Forest a B- safety grade, placing it in the 60th percentile nationally. Still, the same data estimates crime costs each household roughly $959 per year.

With no arrests made and no public accounting of what triggered the shots, the investigation remains open and the timeline of what happened on those streets Wednesday night is still incomplete.