Texas Party Goes Bloody Amid COVID-19 Outbreak, 5 People Shot

KEY POINTS

A shooting incident in Texas ends up with five people wounded
Police say this happened in a park, where a party attracted a crowd of 600
Witnesses say that they heard gunshots, after which people started running everywhere

Five people had been shot in what has been called a “coronavirus party” Sunday night. This happened in a Texas park, where 600 people ignored the rules of social distancing the government had been handing out.

According to Fox News, the shooting happened around 6:30 p.m. at Village Creek Park in Fort Worth, Texas. Police said that two of the five victims were critically injured. Other revelers suffered non-life threatening injuries.

Police interviewed witnesses, who said that they heard 30 shots ring out after fireworks were set off. According to the city's website, parks in Fort Worth are open to the public but the city has continued to urge people to stay at home to observe social distancing, imploring them to refrain from holding large gatherings at the park.

There had been no arrests so far. Fort Worth officer Buddy Calzada, who has been investigating the crime scene, said that they had been giving everyone the most tolerance, Star Tribune reported. Calzada said he regrets everyone's decision to go to the party instead of staying at home which could have avoided the shooting. Calzada added that the state and federal authorities are helping the police force investigate.

As per The Texas Tribune, the coronavirus pandemic in Texas has been looking at ways to restart their economy. So far, 501,776 people had received testing. 38,869 tested positive as of May 10, while 1,088 Texans had unfortunately died. Gov. Greg Abbott said that he is looking at the positive test rate and hospitalization levels as metrics on whether he should open the state again or not.

Harris County has reported the most number of cases so far with 7,803, while Dallas and Tarrant come in second and third with 5,619 and 3,210 cases, respectively. Travis and Bexar completed the top five with 2,095 cases and 1,901 cases, respectively.

It is unfortunate that people continued to ignore the warnings of social distancing, which prompted the shooting. A witness had said that he saw “people running everywhere” and heard shots being fired.