April 16 (Reuters) – At least four people were killed and 28 wounded in a shooting that erupted during an overnight “Sweet 16” birthday celebration at a dance studio in the small town of Dadeville. , Alabama, state police and local news media. said on Sunday.
Some of those injured were critically injured during the shooting in east-central Alabama, about 60 miles (100 km) northeast of the state capital of Montgomery, authorities said. There is no official word on what caused the gun violence.
Authorities said the shooting began shortly after 10:30 p.m. CT on Saturday but declined to answer questions or provide additional details at two news conferences Sunday.
Officials said there was no longer a threat to the community but did not say if a suspect had been killed or arrested.
“We will continue to work in a methodical way to go through this scene, to look at the facts, and make sure that justice is brought to be brought for the families,” said Jeremy Burkett, a sergeant at Alabama Law Enforcement. Agency.
The Montgomery Advertiser newspaper reported that one of the four people killed during the violence was a high school football player who was among those attending his sister’s “Sweet 16” birthday party when a gunman opened fire. fired.
The newspaper, citing the victim’s grandmother, identified the slain teenager as Phil Dowdell, who she said will graduate in a few weeks and plans to attend Jacksonville State University on a football scholarship.
Reuters could not independently confirm the information or determine the identities of the other three victims.
The party was held inside the Mahogany Masterpiece Dance Studio, which was converted from an old bank building located about half a block from city hall in Dadeville, a town of about 3,200 residents. The scene was cordoned off with yellow crime-scene tape on Sunday.
Hundreds of community members gathered early Sunday evening in a parking lot a few blocks from the shooting scene for an outdoor prayer vigil.
‘WHAT HAPPENED TO OUR COUNTRY?’
The bloodshed in Alabama marked the third high-profile shooting in as many weeks in the US South, after separate outbreaks of deadly gun violence in Tennessee and Kentucky prompted local leaders to call for of stricter gun control measures.
Dadeville itself has been rocked by at least one previous mass shooting in August of 2016, when a gunman wounded five people during a party at an American Legion hall, according to the Montgomery Advertiser.
“What has our country become when children cannot attend a birthday party without fear?” President Joe Biden said in a statement on Sunday.
Biden called rising gun violence in the US “tragic and unacceptable,” and urged the US Congress to pass laws to hold gun manufacturers more accountable for gun violence, ban assault weapons attack and high-capacity ammunition magazines, and require safe storage of weapons and ammunition. background check for gun sales.
Tallapoosa County Schools Superintendent Raymond Porter said counseling will be provided at area schools on Monday, and asked local clergy to help families in the situation.
“We are making every effort to comfort the children and not lose sight of the fact that they are the most affected by this situation,” said Porter.
Meanwhile, Republicans vying for their party’s 2024 presidential nomination and other prominent party members are seeking to portray themselves as unwavering supporters of gun rights without restrictions on Indiana at the weekend of the annual conference of the National Rifle Association (NRA), the largest gun lobby in the country.
The Dadeville killings came five days after a bank employee shot five co-workers and wounded nine others at his workplace in Louisville, Kentucky. On March 27, three 9-year-olds and three staff members were killed at a private Christian school in Nashville, Tennessee, by a former student.
Mass shootings are becoming more common in the US, with more than 163 so far in 2023, the most at this point in the year since at least 2016, according to the Gun Violence Archive. The nonprofit group defines a mass shooting as anything in which four or more people are injured or killed, not including the shooter.
Reporting by Julia Harte Editing by Bill Berkrot
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.