I don't enjoy writing about shootings. I really don't like it when people are killed, and a pile of others are injured. It gets especially true when they happen not that far from where I live.
In this case, it happened in Vienna, GA (pronounced VY-inna, not VE-inna, for the record).
Now, two people are dead, a mess of others are injured, and the authorities can't even tell us how many of the injured were shot.
Law enforcement officials are still working to determine just what happened when a chaotic homecoming party spanning a four-block radius of a southern Georgia town erupted in gunfire early Sunday, leaving two people dead and nearly three dozen others injured.
Dooly County Sheriff Craig Peavy identified the two people killed as 21-year-old Jaquevion Jackson of Cordele and 23-year-old Macaleb Jackson of Hawkinsville, Georgia. He did not say if the two were related.
Some of the three dozen injured had gunshot wounds, Georgia Bureau of Investigation Chris Hosey said Sunday evening, but he could not provide a number.
“We’re still trying to work through that,” Hosey said during a news conference Sunday evening.
No arrests had been reported hours later, and authorities gave no possible motive for the gunfire.
The injured ranged in age from 14 to 51, and they were taken to several regional hospitals, Peavy said. Some were in critical condition Sunday evening and others were stable, he said.
This party was huge, with over 1,000 people reportedly attending.
Undoubtedly, this will become part of the gun control conversation here in the state as former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms seeks to become the first Democrat governor since then Gov. Roy Barnes lost to Sonny Perdue in 2003.
However, there may be a problem with that based on early witness reports.
Ashley Gee, 30, who lives in nearby Turner County and came to Vienna for the party, described to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution a constant barrage of gunfire, imitating the sound of rapid-fire shots.
“Like a machine gun,” she said. “One person ran, and everybody started running.”
Now, "like a machine gun" isn't exactly a scientific observation. It could just mean someone pulled the trigger really quickly.
It could also mean that someone used an auto-sear, which is illegal under federal law. Georgia might be more of a purple state these days than I'm comfortable with, but that doesn't mean people are going to flock to a candidate that calls for banning a popular model of handgun, as some of the most leftist states in the nation have done.
We like guns here, after all.
Still, this isn't helpful politically, but it damn sure isn't helpful to kill people and cause dozens of injuries in any way, shape, or form.
I can speculate about what will be learned, but these large block parties are the target of these kinds of shootings more often than some might believe. The shootings are still rare, with block parties and other outdoor gatherings occurring all over the country pretty much every weekend, but this one sounds like it's about as bad as it could have been, and with this many people hurt, I personally don't feel like quibbling over how this isn't an actual mass shooting.
It's a shooting; it was bad, and I pray those responsible are arrested quickly and brought to justice.
Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their extreme gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
Help us continue to report on and expose the Democrats’ gun-grabbing schemes. Join Bearing Arms VIP and use promo code FIGHT to receive 60% off your membership.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member