STOCKTON, CALIF. • A California serial killer seems to be “on a mission” throughout the fatal shooting of six men and the wounding of one woman dating back to last year.

Ballistics tests and some video evidence linked the crimes in Stockton and Oakland, about 70 miles Kilometers) apart, police said.

“We don’t know what the motive is. What we do believe is that it’s mission-oriented,” Stockton Police Chief Stanley Mcfadden said Tuesday. “This person’s on a mission.”

The first fatal shooting was in Oakland in April 2021. The woman was wounded in Stockton days later. More than a year passed, then the five killings in Stockton took place between July 8 and Sept. 27, all within a radius of a few square miles, police said.