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West Virginia Police Probe Possible 4th Shooting
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CHARLESTON, W.Va. (Reuters) - Authorities pursuing a possible serial sniper in three West Virginia convenience store murders on Thursday investigated a report of shots being fired at a fourth location, police said.



A 16-year-old girl told investigators she heard a bullet whiz past her head at a Go Mart gas station convenience store near Charleston at 11:30 p.m. on Wednesday. She said the shot may have come from a maroon pickup truck.


There were no injuries and police could not confirm that a shot had actually been fired.


Soon after that report, a Kanawha County sheriff's deputy saw a pickup truck speeding down a nearby highway and gave chase but lost sight of the vehicle, police said.


Police have spent days searching for a dark-colored pickup truck, possibly a Ford F-150, which witnesses say they saw at the scene of two fatal convenience store shootings on Aug. 14 with a large white man behind the wheel.


Ballistic tests show both victims -- Jeanie Patton, 31, and Okey Meadows, 26, of Campbells Creek -- were killed at different locations by the same .22-caliber weapon.


A third victim, 44-year-old Gary Carrier, died four days earlier at a convenience store in Charleston. But tests have yet to show he was shot by the same weapon.


Police said the murders of Patton and Meadows could be drug-related and want to question a tall white man with a beard, who is not considered a suspect.