Family members of a man shot and killed early Monday morning in Richmond’s Richmore Village/Metro Square neighborhood say it was 23-year-old Josue Cornejo, according to a GoFundMe campaign.
Cornejo was shot and killed just before 6 a.m. near the intersection of Marina Way and Bissell Avenue. There were multiple reports of shots fired and a ShotSpotter alert, police said in a Facebook post.
“Josue was a good son, a loving friend, and a humble young man with a big heart. He didn’t deserve this,” wrote Reina Cornejo, his mother. “We are a humble Salvadoran family, and Josue was trying to help us get back on our feet. We were even planning to move back soon to be closer to family, but this tragedy has changed everything. I am still in shock and in so much pain. Losing him this way has broken us.”
So far, as of Tuesday afternoon, the campaign had collected $3,140 for Cornejo’s burial expenses.
“I never thought that I would experience a pain like this, so hard and difficult. As mothers, we expect our children to bury us not for us to bury our children,” she said in a Facebook post shared late Monday night.
On Tuesday afternoon, Richmond police confirmed that Cornejo was the victim in the shooting.
On late Monday the scene, including a number of parked cars — one with a bullet hole in the windshield — remained taped off with yellow crime tape, a small amount of blood visible near a tarp on the sidewalk. A police car was parked nearby.
Richmond police said they found Cornejo with “at least one gunshot wound” and, despite life-saving measures, he was pronounced dead at the scene.
The incident marks the city’s fourth homicide of 2025. It occurred a little more than a week after the third shooting death of the year.
Anyone with information is asked to contact the department’s homicide investigators, detective Mariah Farr, at (510) 620-6622.
This is a developing story. Check back for further updates.
