Question 1

Why is quiso used instead of quería if it just translates to "wanted to"?

Accepted Answer

In Spanish, the preterite of querer (quiso) often implies an active attempt to do something, whereas the imperfect (quería) describes an ongoing state of wanting. Here, quiso saber implies the correspondent actively tried to find out, likely by asking a question, rather than just passively harboring a desire to know.

Question 2

Why does the subject el tiroteo come after the verb había ocurrido?

Accepted Answer

It is very common in Spanish to place the subject after the verb in indirect questions and relative clauses. Saying por qué había ocurrido el tiroteo sounds much more natural to a native speaker than keeping the English word order of por qué el tiroteo había ocurrido.

Question 3

Why does por qué have an accent mark even though this isn't a direct question with question marks?

Accepted Answer

Question words like qué, quién, cuándo, and por qué always keep their accent marks when used in indirect questions. Since the sentence contains an embedded question ("Why did it happen?"), por qué acts as an interrogative and keeps the accent to distinguish it from porque (because).

Question 4

Why do we use había ocurrido here instead of the simple past ocurrió?

Accepted Answer

Había ocurrido is the past perfect tense (often called the pluperfect). We use it to talk about an action in the past that happened before another past action. Because the shootout took place before the correspondent asked about it, we use the past perfect to show it is the older of the two events.

El corresponsal quiso saber por qué había ocurrido el tiroteo en esa calle.

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