Pizza delivery driver shot dead during shift on New Year’s Day, Alabama police say
A pizza delivery driver was fatally shot in Alabama during his evening shift on New Year’s Day, police said.
Officers responded to multiple calls about the shooting at about 9 p.m. Jan. 1 in Birmingham, where they found a man with a gunshot wound lying on a private roadway, the police department said in a Jan. 2 news release.
Police said the man was pronounced dead at the scene. He was later identified by the Jefferson County Coroner’s Office as 51-year-old Derek Burpo.
Police said Burpo was en route to deliver a pizza when he was shot.
“This is one of the most heart-breaking homicides that we have witnessed in our city,” Birmingham officer Truman Fitzgerald told WBRC, which reported it is the first homicide of the year. “You have a man that’s out on the very first day of 2025 making a living, trying to support his family and someone committed the worst robbery that you can commit. Robbed a family of their loved one.”
No suspects have been identified, and the investigation is ongoing, police said.
Birmingham homicides
The shooting comes on the heels of a record-setting year for homicides in Birmingham, WBRC and AL.com reported.
WBRC reported there were 149 homicides in 2024, while AL.com reported there were 151, the highest number since 1933.
Of the nation’s 38 mass killings in 2024, three were in Birmingham, according to data from The Associated Press, USA Today and Northeastern University.
“We are a city that has seen the devastation that firearms in the wrong hands have caused,” Fitzgerald said.
Gun violence in the US
Thousands of people die every year from firearm injuries in the U.S. each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Firearm injuries and deaths continue to be a significant public health problem in the United States,” the CDC said. “In 2022, there were more than 48,000 firearm-related deaths in the United States according to mortality data. That’s about 132 people dying from a firearm-related injury each day.”
Firearm-related injuries were one of the top leading causes of death for people ages 1 to 44 in 2022, the CDC reported.
The impact of gun violence, however, goes beyond the death toll, experts said.
“The effects of firearm violence and injury extend beyond victims and their families,” officials said. “Shooting incidents, including those in homes, schools, houses of worship, or workplaces, shopping areas, on the street or at community events can affect the sense of safety and security of entire communities and impact everyday decisions.”
This story was originally published January 2, 2025 at 2:46 PM with the headline "Pizza delivery driver shot dead during shift on New Year’s Day, Alabama police say."
