Two Christmas day crime scenes in Lehigh Acres

Patrol vehicles staked out in front of the Quality Inn in Lehigh Acres. As Lee County Deputies investigated, hotel guest were forced to wait. They were told to get back into their rooms, like Steve Kelly, who is staying here from out of town after a Christmas celebration.

“I’m not happy,” Kelly said. “I’m not happy about it..”

“You just got to be aware of your situation all the time,” Bill Gott said, a hotel guest. “Christmas or not criminals don’t make any exceptions for holidays.”

Less than seven miles down the road earlier Christmas Day, more Deputy vehicles and more crime scene tape are up in Lehigh Acres. According to the Lee County Sheriff’s Office, detectives were investigating a shooting.

“That’s the world we live in,” Kelly said.

Seventh St. SW and Ivan Ave. were blocked off. It is another crime keeping neighbors, like Joanne Mora who has two kids, on the lookout.

“My kids don’t play outside,” Mora said. “Unless I’m outside, regardless even if it was a good neighborhood.”

Lee County Deputies are calling the shooting an isolated incident. But it does not feel like it to Mora.

“It’s happened before,” Mora said. “That they’ve blocked roads before, but like I said, we don’t get involved in nobody, we don’t argue with anybody.”

Mora and her family have lived in this Lehigh neighborhood for four years. She stays even with the recent crime.

“My life and my kids’ life and my parents’ life are not in danger,” Mora said, “because I leave my family in God’s hands.”