An apartment complex where a Western Kentucky University student was shot Tuesday night had the highest number of shots-fired calls of any address in the Bowling Green city limits in 2015.

Mario Lopez, 18, was shot multiple times in a breezeway at College Suites, 2426 Thoroughbred Drive, and was flown to Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville on Tuesday, Bowling Green Police Department spokesman Officer Ronnie Ward said. 

Lopez was in critical but stable condition Wednesday, said his friend Samuel Cawthon, who lives in apartment No. 338 – the unit outside which Lopez was shot. Vanderbilt does not publicly release conditions of patients who are victims of violent crime, a hospital spokeswoman said Wednesday.

No arrests have been made and no clear motive has been established, Ward said.

Police were called to three shots-fired calls at College Suites in 2014, 10 in 2015 and three so far this year, Ward said. Of those calls, police substantiated that shots had been fired twice in 2015 and once so far in 2016. Police did not substantiate any of the shots-fired calls in 2014.

An unsubstantiated call means responding officers could not locate any evidence that shots had been fired, Ward said.

Police were called to the complex 357 times in 2014 and 403 times in 2015. So far in 2016, police have been called 67 times.

“I had only been home from work for about an hour when all this happened,” Cawthon said.

“I was in my room. Our friends were leaving. One of them had gone downstairs to start their car to go back to campus,” he said. “I heard a frantic knocking. I cracked open the door. He (Lopez) said, ‘He’s got a gun. He’s trying to rob us. Lock the door.’

“Mario was right here,” Cawthon said, pointing to the breezeway. “I heard the gunshot. He said ‘He got me.’ “

Cawthon pulled Lopez inside his apartment to try to stop the bleeding and called 911 after a couple of minutes had passed.

“He was just in shock and trying to fight the pain,” Cawthon said. “He kept saying to call 911.”

Lopez, Antwan Thomas, 19, and Samuel Mitchell, 20, had been visiting Cawthon and his roommates at the complex just before the shooting, Ward said.

Thomas left the apartment to go outside and warm up the car. A few minutes later, Mitchell and Lopez left the apartment to meet Thomas and saw Thomas in a confrontation with another man while a second man was standing nearby.

When Mitchell and Lopez saw the confrontation, they turned to go back to the apartment, where they were met by that second man and words were exchanged, Ward said. Police do not know why the men exchanged words. Cawthon also said he doesn’t know why the shooting occurred.

Lopez and Thomas are both WKU students. Mitchell was a student last semester but is not enrolled this semester, WKU spokesman Bob Skipper said.

Residents at the apartment complex had mixed reactions to the incident.

Cawthon said he is not scared and will continue to live there. His roommates were shaken; both left temporarily to spend time with their parents, he said. 

“They are just taking a day or so to settle down,” Cawthon said. “They’re a little shaken up.”

Mitchell and Thomas went to Nashville to see Mario’s mother Wednesday, Cawthon said.

Shannon Humphrey, who is also a WKU student, lives nearby.

“I heard the gunshots, but I didn’t see anything,” she said. 

Humphrey said she still feels safe at the apartment complex.

“I don’t think it was someone targeting a random person,” she said.

Robert Stinnett and his roommate Sarah Ferguson both plan to move out.

“It’s just not safe no more,” Stinnett said.

A woman who said she represents the complex arrived at Cawthon’s apartment while a Daily News reporter was there and referred questions to the complex’s front office. 

College Suites is a fairly new acquisition for Pierce Education Properties L.P., a company based in San Diego, according to Bob Hetherington, a spokesman for College Suites.

The company will be investing in additional safety measures for its residents such as repairing the gates into the complex and hiring security personnel to patrol the property and check IDs to make sure that people who are on the property are allowed to be there.

“We want our residents to feel safe and secure where they live, and as appropriate we will take the necessary steps to be sure that they are,” Hetherington said.

— Follow Assistant City Editor Deborah Highland on Twitter at twitter.com/BGDNCrimebeat or visit bgdailynews.com.