At least nine people have been shot in the US state of Colorado in two separate shooting incidents at religious establishments.
Local media are reporting that at least five people were killed at the New Life Church in Colorado Springs. Police say one of the dead is believed to be the gunman.
Earlier two people were killed and another two injured at a training centre for young missionaries in Denver.
The description of the shooter was similar in both cases but it is not known at this stage if the two shootings are connected.
El Paso County Sheriff Terry Maketa says there is "one gunman down" and "four deceased, possibly one wounded" in the Colorado Springs attack.
The casualty toll was "preliminary," Sheriff Maketa said.
The first shooting took place earlier on Sunday (local time) at a Christian youth missionary centre in the town of Arvada outside Denver, with a young gunman killing two staff members and wounding two others before fleeing on foot.
Police say the missionary centre victims - a man and a woman both employed by the centre - died in hospital after the gunman opened fire just after midnight.
Two other men aged 22 and 23 were receiving treatment for gunshot wounds, with one of them critically injured, a police statement said.
The suspect in the Arvada assault was described as a white male, possibly 20 years of age.
The Colorado shootings came just days after a teenager armed with a semi-automatic rifle opened fire on Christmas shoppers at an Omaha shopping mall in Nebraska on Wednesday, killing at least eight people before turning the gun on himself.