US: Mass shooting at Fourth of July block party on Shreveport leaves 4 dead, 6 injured
Jul 05, 2023
Washington [US], July 6 : A fourth person has died following a mass shooting at a Fourth of July block celebration in Louisiana Shreveport police and District, Councilwoman Tabatha Taylor confirmed Wednesday, CNN reported.
According to Shreveport police spokesman Sgt Angie Willhite, at least ten persons were shot during the melee Tuesday night, with six sustaining non-life threatening injuries.
Police have not officially named the deceased. No suspects have been arrested so far, Taylor said on Wednesday.
The shooting happened late Tuesday night at a Fourth of July block celebration, which has been a "family and community event" for more than a decade with no previous violence, according to the councilwoman.
Due to the large number of vehicles on the site, it was difficult for first responders to reach the victims, police told CNN affiliate KSLA.
"Getting here and getting EMS here was a difficult thing. A lot of us had to park our cars and take off running because there were so many cars on the side of the street," Shreveport police Lt Van Wray told KSLA.
It was one of several shootings that happened around the country over the Fourth of July holiday.
On Sunday, two people were murdered and 28 others were shot and injured at another block party in Baltimore, largely teens. Investigators are looking for multiple assailants, as per CNN.
Five people were killed in Philadelphia on Monday night, including a 15-year-old kid.
The shooter seemed to fire indiscriminately throughout many streets in the city's Kingsessing neighbourhood before being arrested by the policemen, who discovered him with an AR-style rifle and a pistol.
In Texas, three people were killed and eight others were injured late Monday night in Fort Worth, just hours before the neighbourhood's Fourth of July parade on the same street.
And, shortly before 1 am Wednesday, nine people were injured in Washington, DC, including two minors. According to Metropolitan Police Assistant Chief Leslie Parsons, someone in a vehicle "fired shots in the direction of some of our residents that were outside just celebrating the Fourth of July."
According to the Gun Violence Archive, at least 412 people have been killed in mass shootings around the country so far this year, CNN reported.
