Homicide investigators are still trying to determine why a man shot to death at a busy Surrey strip mall late Tuesday was in the area just before his murder.Cpl. Dale Carr o f the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team said the man was known to police, but no motive has yet been determined for the shooting, in which a second man was seriously wounded.The man had been eating at the To Chau Restaurant in the strip mall at 10028 King George prior to the fatal shooting, but Carr said investigators have not confirmed what the man was doing at the time.RCMP went to the scene after receiving a number of shots-fired calls about 10:15 p.m.No one was answering at the restaurant Wednesday, which remained behind police tape for much of the day as police continued to scour the area for evidence in the murder.
Carr said the second victim is so seriously wounded that police have not been able to talk to him.Until well into the morning Wednesday, the victim's body could be seen slumped in a sitting position half in and half out of an idling black car. He appeared to have been shot while sitting in the driver's seat of his vehicle.
Carr said that when police arrived at the scene, they found the second man "in severe medical distress in the direct vicinity of the vehicle.""He was transported to a Metro Vancouver trauma hospital where he has undergone surgery," Carr said,
Although the dead man was parked metres from the door of the Sun Hang Do Martial Arts Studio, there is no evidence of a link between the murder and the gym, Carr said.The master instructor at the studio, Eric Mowat, said he heard the victim had been in the restaurant next to his business."This happened after we were closed," he said. "We close at 9 p.m."He said he had been forced to keep his studio closed all day while investigators continued to work."We are just waiting to reopen. They can't give me an exact time," Mowat said.He was more worried about his students, who range from children to older adults.The mall houses several businesses, including a Fruiticana produce store, restaurants, a women's fitness centre, an HSBC branch and a wireless company right next door to Mowat's martial arts centre.Carr said investigators would be screening any available surveillance video from the busy complex or neighbouring businesses."The crime scene has been examined by the Integrated Forensic Identification Section, the Police Dog Service has conducted a search of the area," he said. "Neighbourhood inquiries will be conducted in hopes that a nearby resident saw something that can advance the investigation."Carr said "investigators are not able to link this incident to drugs or organized crime, and are not yet able to say whether this was a targeted incident."But he also said there was no indication that a random killer was on the loose in Surrey.Late Tuesday and early Wednesday, plainclothes homicide detectives and uniformed RCMP members combed the area behind the yellow police tape that stretched for half a block.
The strip mall is across the street from Surrey Central mall, kitty-corner from Holland Park and just a block from a SkyTrain station. Just two blocks south of the murder scene and a little east is the Balmoral Tower, where six people were slaughtered on Oct. 19, 2007.