Late on the night of August 6, 2023, a drive-by shooting on northbound U.S. Highway 71 near 22nd Street in Kansas City, Missouri, left two teens inside a stopped vehicle with gunshot wounds. One victim, 15-year-old Diego Alexander Almeda, who would have turned 16 four days later, was taken to a nearby hospital but died of his injuries. A second teenage male was transported in critical condition.

Police reported that the shots appeared to have come from another vehicle, but no description of a suspect or car was available and detectives found no immediate link to other recent homicides. No arrests or public identifications of suspects have been announced. The family and community are left seeking answers after the loss of a boy on the cusp of his sixteenth birthday.

If anyone has information about the shooting or saw activity on U.S. Highway 71 near 22nd Street that night, please come forward.