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There were more than a dozen multi-casualty shootings over the holiday weekend. As The New York Times became the latest media outlet to report on the decline in many categories of crime during the coronavirus, gun violence remained an exception, with bullets flying near beaches, at house parties, and outside clubs and restaurants.
- On Saturday, seven people were shot, two fatally, at a block party in Jonesville, South Carolina; five men were shot and wounded outside a restaurant in Sunrise, Florida and six people were wounded in a shooting in Daytona Beach, Florida; six people were shot and wounded at a gathering in a parking lot in Charlotte, North Carolina; five people were shot, one fatally, at a large gathering in Rock lsland, Illinois; four men were shot, one fatally, in a suburb of Flint, Michigan; and four people were wounded in a shooting at a nightclub in Houston.
- On Sunday, three people were killed and one person was wounded in a domestic shooting in Danville, Alabama; five people were shot, one fatally, at a home in Jackson, Mississippi; four people were wounded on the tourist strip in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina; and four people were wounded in St. Louis, where 15 others were shot in separate incidents over the weekend.
- On Monday, six teenagers were shot and wounded at an unsupervised high school graduation party in Lake Charles, Louisiana.
Chicago marked the unofficial start of summer with a burst of shootings. With the city still under a stay-a-home order, 10 people were fatally shot and 38 others were wounded between Friday and Monday, according to a preliminary count by The Chicago Sun-Times. It was Chicago’s deadliest Memorial Day weekend since 2015. Three teenagers were among those struck. Hoping to quell the gunfire, prevention organizations had dispatched nearly 400 street outreach workers to 72 “hot spots” for gun violence, Lakeidra Chavis reported last week.
Gun rights protesters hanged an effigy of the Kentucky governor. The incident capped a pro-Second Amendment/anti-quarantine rally that drew about 100 people to the state Capitol in Frankfort on Sunday. The Courier-Journal of Louisville reported that one of the men who strung up a likeness of Democratic Governor Andy Beshear from a tree was wearing an arm band bearing the insignia of the anti-government Three Percenter militia. Politicians from both parties condemned the action, including Senate Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentuckian, who called it “unacceptable.”
Husband of ReOpenNC organizer threatens violence. Adam Smith, who is married to the founder of the North Carolina anti-lockdown group, said in a Facebook video posted Friday, “Are we willing to kill people? Are we willing to lay our lives down? We have to say yes.” He added: “If you bring force, we’re gonna bring force. If you bring guns, we’re gonna bring guns.” At a rally on Monday, Smith, a former Marine, said he didn’t intend to incite violence with the remarks. State law bans guns at rallies.
Attorney claims the Justice Department is investigating the Ahmaud Arbery shooting as a hate crime. A lawyer for Arbery’s family told CNN that he learned of the development from the office of the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Georgia, which is looking into why it took more than two months to make an arrest after Arbery was gunned down by white vigilantes while jogging. Former police officer Gregory McMichael, his son Travis, and William Bryan, a friend who recorded the shooting, were charged with murder earlier this month.
A new study zeroes in on the groups at highest risk of gun suicide. Among other findings, researchers at Columbia University Medical Center calculated that suicide rates are elevated for men who are widowers. Among women, rates were highest for those who’d lost income and those with a disability.
Prosecutors drop attempted murder charges against boyfriend of an EMT gunned down by police in Louisville, Kentucky. Kenneth Walker, a licensed gun owner, shot a police officer in the leg during the no-knock raid in March that killed his girlfriend, Breonna Taylor. Walker maintained that he thought the cops were intruders and feared for his life. Prosecutors dropped the charges a day after the FBI said they had opened an investigation into the shooting.
DATA POINT
15 children and teens have been shot in Milwaukee since April 1, three of them fatally. “The pandemic did not slow down the level of gun violence that we began the year,” said Reggie Moore, director of the city’s Office of Violence Prevention. [CBS 58]
