Three people were on Saturday shot outside a baseball stadium crowded with thousands of spectators in Washington, causing the game to be abruptly halted as fans were ushered out.
Police initially wrote on Twitter that four people had been shot, but Metropolitan Police Department Executive Assistant Chief of Police Ashan Benedict later said there were three wounded in the incident.
He said two of those hit were in one of two vehicles that was involved in a shootout.
Photo: AP
The third victim was a woman on the sidewalk outside the stadium where she had been attending the game.
“At no time during this incident were individuals inside the stadium attending the game in any type of danger. This was not an active shooter incident. Everything took place outside the stadium,” Benedict told reporters.
He said the woman was “expected to be OK.”
Agence France-Presse journalists who were at the game said some spectators had rushed for the exits after hearing a dozen or more gunshots outside the stadium, while others remained in their seats at the announcer’s initial urging.
Several bursts of automatic gunfire could be clearly heard in the stadium in footage of the game posted on social media, while another video showed streams of people sprinting away from the stands.
The US has a long and painful history of deadly gun violence, in the form of a steady daily toll of shootings as well as high-profile mass killings that have targeted schools, workplaces and shopping centers.
The lights of multiple police vehicles lit up the street and sirens could be heard as the crowd attending the game between the Washington Nationals and the San Diego Padres was asked to leave the stadium, in the Navy Yard neighborhood of southern Washington.
Police wrote on Twitter that the investigation was active, but that “it appears there is no ongoing threat at this time.”
The department initially said two people had been shot, and then later added that further “victims associated with this incident walked into area hospitals for treatment of gunshot wounds.”
The Washington Post quoted police as saying that two of the wounded had non-life threatening injuries, with a man shot in the leg and a woman shot in the back.
The condition of the third person was not immediately known.
An intersection by the Third Base Gate of the stadium where the shooting occurred was sealed off by police.
Players had headed for the dugouts after the shots rang out and the game was suspended in the bottom of the 6th inning, with the Padres leading by eight runs to four. The game was to be resumed yesterday.
There have been just more than 100 homicides in Washington this year, many of them involving firearms.
Police on Saturday offered a US$60,000 reward after a six-year-old girl was shot dead the day before while riding a scooter in southeast Washington.
BACKLASH: The National Party quit its decades-long partnership with the Liberal Party after their election loss to center-left Labor, which won a historic third term Australia’s National Party has split from its conservative coalition partner of more than 60 years, the Liberal Party, citing policy differences over renewable energy and after a resounding loss at a national election this month. “Its time to have a break,” Nationals leader David Littleproud told reporters yesterday. The split shows the pressure on Australia’s conservative parties after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s center-left Labor party won a historic second term in the May 3 election, powered by a voter backlash against US President Donald Trump’s policies. Under the long-standing partnership in state and federal politics, the Liberal and National coalition had shared power
A Croatian town has come up with a novel solution to solve the issue of working parents when there are no public childcare spaces available: pay grandparents to do it. Samobor, near the capital, Zagreb, has become the first in the country to run a “Grandmother-Grandfather Service,” which pays 360 euros (US$400) a month per child. The scheme allows grandparents to top up their pension, but the authorities also hope it will boost family ties and tackle social isolation as the population ages. “The benefits are multiple,” Samobor Mayor Petra Skrobot told reporters. “Pensions are rather low and for parents it is sometimes
CONTROVERSY: During the performance of Israel’s entrant Yuval Raphael’s song ‘New Day Will Rise,’ loud whistles were heard and two people tried to get on stage Austria’s JJ yesterday won the Eurovision Song Contest, with his operatic song Wasted Love triumphing at the world’s biggest live music television event. After votes from national juries around Europe and viewers from across the continent and beyond, JJ gave Austria its first victory since bearded drag performer Conchita Wurst’s 2014 triumph. After the nail-biting drama as the votes were revealed running into yesterday morning, Austria finished with 436 points, ahead of Israel — whose participation drew protests — on 357 and Estonia on 356. “Thank you to you, Europe, for making my dreams come true,” 24-year-old countertenor JJ, whose
A documentary whose main subject, 25-year-old photojournalist Fatima Hassouna, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza weeks before it premiered at Cannes stunned viewers into silence at the festival on Thursday. As the cinema lights came back on, filmmaker Sepideh Farsi held up an image of the young Palestinian woman killed with younger siblings on April 16, and encouraged the audience to stand up and clap to pay tribute. “To kill a child, to kill a photographer is unacceptable,” Farsi said. “There are still children to save. It must be done fast,” the exiled Iranian filmmaker added. With Israel
RSS