3 dead, 4 injured in fourth mass shooting in US' California this month: Report

Of the seven people who were shot, four were standing outside. The three who were killed were in a vehicle.

At least three people were killed and four others were wounded in a shooting in California area early Saturday morning.

A message is written at a memorial outside Star Dance Studio for the victims killed in last week's mass shooting in Monterey Park, California. (AP)

Sgt. Frank Preciado of the Los Angeles Police Department confirmed the shooting happened just after 2:30 am in Beverly Crest, an upscale Los Angeles neighborhood.

Of the seven people who were shot, four were standing outside. The three who were killed were in a vehicle.

Their identities were not released. Those who were injured were taken to a hospital and are in critical condition.

Preciado said he did not have information on what led up to the shooting, or if it occurred at a residence.

This is the fourth mass shooting in California this month.

The shooting comes a week after a massacre at a dance hall in a Los Angeles suburb left 11 dead and nine wounded and only days after a gunman opened fire on a pair of mushroom farms south of San Francisco on Monday, fatally shooting seven people and wounding one. The killings have dealt a blow to the state, which has some of the nation’s toughest firearm laws and lowest rates of gun deaths.

For the third straight year, the US in 2022 recorded over 600 mass shootings in which at least four people were killed or injured, according to the Gun Violence Archive.