BATON ROUGE, La. — Two women who were Southern University students and members of the school’s athletic program were shot and killed early Sunday outside a Baton Rouge apartment complex, police and university officials said.

Detectives didn’t immediately identify any suspects or motives in the shooting, which occurred in a parking lot outside an apartment complex around 2 a.m., said Baton Rouge Police Sergeant Don Coppola Jr.

A mother of one of the slain students said police told her that her daughter, 19-year-old Lashuntae Benton of Lake Charles, wasn’t an intended target of the shooting.

Theresa Tillman said her daughter was living in a dormitory on Southern’s campus and apparently was attending a party at the apartment complex where the shooting occurred.

Southern University system president Ray Belton identified the other slain student as Annette January, of Gary.

January, also 19, was a freshman and a member of the school’s track and field team, while Benton was a sophomore and a student athletic trainer, Belton said in a statement.

A 24-year-old man also was wounded in the shooting but his injuries weren’t considered life-threatening, police said in a statement.

One of the two women killed in the shooting was pronounced dead at the scene of the shooting; the other died at a hospital shortly after the shooting, police said.

Associated Press