This story was updated at 1:53 p.m. Feb. 7, 2012.

A 16-year-old student at Springdale’s Charles H. Flowers High School and a 23-year-old Greenbelt man were identified Tuesday as the two people shot Monday night outside New Carrollton in less than an hour and within a half-mile of one another.

Prince George's County police said Tuesday it was not clear whether the victims knew each other or whether the deaths are connected.

Christopher Donald Smith, 16, of the 2300 block of Brightseat Road in Landover was found shot along a woodline in a grassy area at about 10:45 p.m. in the 5300 block of 85th Avenue, said Julie Parker, a county police spokeswoman, at a Tuesday news conference.

Smith was pronounced dead at the scene after police responded to a call for a welfare check. His body was found technically outside city limits, but New Carrollton police stayed on the scene to assist county police, said New Carrollton Police Chief David Rice.

Police got a call at 11:32 p.m. that a county ambulance crew returning from the scene of Smith’s death had spotted a second male lying next to a bicycle at in the 5800 block of 78th Avenue, said Cpl. Larry Johnson, a county police spokesman.

Alfonso Edward Thompson Jr., 23, of the 7000 block of Hanover Parkway in Greenbelt had been shot and was pronounced dead at the scene, Parker said.

Police are asking anyone who may have seen Thompson riding his bike to call them with information.

The deaths are the county’s seventh and eighth homicides to date for 2012, said Cpl. Henry Tippett, a county police spokesman.

Charles Flowers High School principal Helena Nobles-Jones said Tuesday the news of Smith’s death was “devastating,” and offered condolences to his family.

“To lose someone at such a young age to violence, it’s just devastating,” Nobles-Jones said. “It happens too often to our kids. We have to do something to stop the rage in people’s hearts, to do this to children.”

nmcgill@gazette.net

Staff Writer Erich Wagner contributed to this report.