Lyft driver Tomselyn Tso says she was sitting in her car at the light at Sixth Avenue and Congress Street in downtown Tucson at bar closing time early Sunday when she heard gunshots.
"I think there were like, maybe more than 15 shots that went off."
It was frightening, "being able to hear the shots so close and not knowing where it was coming from and just having to sit there waiting for the light to turn," she says.
"There were uniformed officers that were sitting on the SE corner right next to me, and I saw them all get down when the shooting started, and as soon as the shots stopped, they started running across the street.
"In the moment all I could think to do was get down in my car. I went down over my console."
Evidence markers lay near items of clothing as part of the Tucson Police Department investigation where nine people were injured in a shooting in downtown Tucson early Sunday morning, July 19, 2026.
"As I passed Congress after the shots and the light was green I looked and saw a guy laying on the sidewalk" on the east side of Sixth Avenue, Tso says.
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"It was a guy wearing all black it looked like. He was laying on the ground rolling back and forth so I believe he was shot."
Then, "the passengers I was supposed to pick up were waving me down, so I stopped for them. I drove away from downtown to get out of the area as quickly as I could.
"It was chaos. People were all running away from Congress and scattered everywhere. Police units were coming from every direction to get to the area."
In Tso's car, a woman passenger, who had also heard the shots, "was having almost like a panic attack."
"She told me that her and her man had not been downtown in over 10 years and this was the first time they had gone out downtown. She was saying they weren’t going out downtown anymore.
"A large group of them had met up. During the ride they were calling everyone that was in their group to make sure they were all OK. They got a hold of everyone in their group. There was some that were stuck downtown and couldn’t get their vehicles out because the police had already set up barricades by then."
"It didn’t seem real to me because I have never been so close to shots like that," Tso says. "I usually work the closing time hours on the weekend and have never had any problems or come across situations like this before."
Reflecting later Sunday on what she had seen, Tso said she thinks the man she saw on the ground might have been the suspect, who police say was shot and injured by an officer before being taken into custody, rather than one of the victims of the mass shooting, "because I didn’t see anyone else nearby shot or down on the ground. Not positive about that but I was thinking maybe if the suspect ran from the scene."
Police say nine victims were shot and injured in the shooting around 2 a.m. outside of a business in the 100 block of East Congress, near Sixth Avenue.
"It was just really scary to hear and see what I did," Tso says. "I’m glad there were so many officers in the area and that they were able to get the person responsible."
