INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana State Police is investigating after a man was shot during a possible road rage incident on Interstate 465 Sunday evening.
Around 9:45 p.m. Aug. 27, troopers were called to the area of the 53 mile-marker, just east of Interstate 65 on Indianapolis' southeast side, for a report of a person shot.
A trooper found a man with an apparent gunshot wound and provided aid until medics arrived, applying a tourniquet to stop the bleeding.
The man was described by state police as "stable" when taken to a local hospital.
A preliminary investigation leads ISP detectives to believe the shooting "stemmed from a possible road rage incident along I-465."
“We understand there are aggressive drivers out there. There are dangerous drivers out there. But we would discourage anyone from engaging in any type of road rage, an attempt to slow them down, an attempt to not allow them to merge," Indiana State Police Sgt. John Perrine said. "Don’t give hand gestures, don’t honk your horn in an angry manner. All of those things could potentially lead to the violence that we’re seeing.”
State police say so far this year, they've investigated 39 shootings on Indianapolis-area interstates. In 2022, they reported 66 shootings and 65 in 2021.
It's a steep increase from nine shootings in 2018 and 2019.
"We believed at that time, most of those shootings were targeted. Individuals who knew each other, parties who knew each other," Perrine said. "Since then, we’ve seen a substantial amount of road rage shootings. Now to last year, we believe the vast majority of the 66 that we investigated stemmed from a road rage incident."
This year, state police have also counted 124 incidents on Indianapolis-area interstates where someone flashes or points a gun at another vehicle.
Information on a possible suspect or suspect vehicle was still being gathered as of Sunday night, ISP said.
Detectives are asking anyone driving along I-465 near Emerson Avenue on Indianapolis' south side who may have witnessed the incident, or has a vehicle with a recording device, to contact Indiana State Police.
"We have a lot of technology available to us to investigate these types of crimes and these types of incidents. However, we can’t replace the eyewitness accounts or the dash cameras that maybe were there in the area before, after or during the incident," Perrine said.