2 killed and 9 injured in a Memorial Day shooting at a Philadelphia park
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — There are no excuses for violence like the Memorial Day shooting at a Philadelphia park that killed two people and injured nine, the city's mayor said Tuesday.
Two young adults died after the Monday night shooting in Fairmount Park, police Commissioner Kevin Bethel said Tuesday. Those injured in the Memorial Day shooting were listed in stable condition, he said. Police said no arrests have been made.
'This is a heinous act of violence that was inhumane. No regard for life," Mayor Cherelle Parker said at a news conference. 'We will not be held hostage by anyone who decides that they want to get assault-like, warlike weaponry."
It wasn't yet clear what led up to the shooting or whether those who were shot were targeted, the police commissioner said. No weapons had been recovered, but investigators found casings from three weapons, Bethel said. From the rapid-fire gunshots heard in videos shared on social media, he said they can determine that a switch, which automates a semiautomatic weapon, was used.
'That's the sound of war. When you have an automatic weapon that you can empty a magazine — a 20-clip magazine — in seconds," Bethel said. "It is meant to kill, to create carnage and to hit as many people as possible. And in this case, you see, it was able to do that.'
Police identified those killed as Amya Devlin, 23, and Mikhail Bowers, 21. The wounded include a 15-year-old boy and two girls, ages 16 and 17, police said. The other injured people, four women and two men, range in age from 18 to 28.
Bethel did not know how many people were at the park at the time of the shooting, but noted that estimates were in the hundreds. The shooting occurred despite officers' presence in the park, Bethel said.
'We try to manage the crowds as they unfold, but at the same token, it is a challenge when individuals decide that they're going to fire into a crowd,' Bethel said.
Officers were called in to disperse crowds earlier in the evening and met with adults, who agreed to start shutting down, but Bethel said it took time and there a large number of young people blended into the crowd.
Bethel has noticed concerns about the Roots Picnic music festival, which is planned in Fairmount Park next weekend, but explained that such an event with significant planning is different from an unplanned one, as there was Monday night. Starting next weekend, Bethel said the department will boost deployments in the park and work to identify problems ahead of time, Bethel said.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Hill
30 minutes ago
- The Hill
Private prison operator blocked from housing ICE detainees at shuttered facility
A judge in Kansas issued a Wednesday ruling determining that a private prison operator could not use its shuttered facility to house detainees from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Leavenworth County Judge John Bryant granted a temporary restraining order blocking CoreCivic from housing individuals in the custody of ICE. The order was issued after a March lawsuit was thrown out in May on technical grounds, according to the Associated Press. CoreCivic did not immediately reply to The Hill's request for comment on the ruling. Earlier this year, executives applied to use their 1,033-bed facility to help the Trump administration facilitate removals in its crackdown on illegal immigration. CoreCivic said it would lose $4.2 million each month it wasn't open, according to legal files reviewed by AP. The company applied for a permit to use the grounds for ICE operations but withdrew its application in May alleging it didn't need permission from the city to determine which detainees to house. 'It became clear to CoreCivic that there was not a cooperative relationship,' said Taylor Concannon Hausmann, an attorney for the private prison operator, speaking in court, as reported by the AP. However, city attorney Joe Hatley urged the company to 'follow the rules' and obtain the proper permit for operations. The CoreCivic property is located 10 miles away from the Kansas City International Airport and has previously worked with federal officials to house pre-trial detainees, according to the AP. In 2021, the Tennessee-based company stopped working for the U.S. Marshals Service after former President Biden urged the Justice Department to cease contracts with private prison operators. Multiple inmate violations were flagged in addition to reported suicides and killings. The Trump administration has been working with the private sector to undertake deportation efforts, including the GEO Group, which is planning to reopen New Jersey's Delaney Hall to hold individuals awaiting removal. Democrats have protested the use of the facility for federal purposes citing concerns about federal operations within Newark, a designated sanctuary city.
Associated Press
an hour ago
- Associated Press
Trump alleges that, under Biden, 'whoever used the autopen was the president'
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump intensified his assertions — without evidence — that officials using an autopen undermined the actions of his predecessor, Joe Biden, even suggesting Thursday that 'essentially whoever used the autopen was president.' 'I happen to think I know' who was using a tool that allows for auto signatures, Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, while saying it was the 'biggest scandal' in years. The Justice Department under Democratic and Republican administrations has recognized the use of an autopen to sign legislation and issue pardons for decades. Trump presented no evidence that Biden was unaware of the actions taken in his name, and the president's absolute pardon power is enshrined in the U.S. Constitution. 'It's a very bad thing, very dangerous,' Trump said, arguing that, 'Essentially, whoever used the autopen was the president.' Those comments came a day after Trump directed his administration to investigate Biden's actions as president, alleging aides masked his predecessor's 'cognitive decline' and casting doubts on the legitimacy of his use of the autopen to sign pardons and other documents. An executive order he signed marked a significant escalation in Trump's targeting of political adversaries and could lay the groundwork for arguments by the Republican that a range of Biden's actions as president were invalid. Biden responded in a statement Wednesday night: 'Let me be clear: I made the decisions during my presidency. I made the decisions about the pardons, executive orders, legislation, and proclamations. Any suggestion that I didn't is ridiculous and false.' Trump wrote in a memo Wednesday that, 'This conspiracy marks one of the most dangerous and concerning scandals in American history.' The American public, he said, 'was purposefully shielded from discovering who wielded the executive power, all while Biden's signature was deployed across thousands of documents to effect radical policy shifts.' Trump directed Attorney General Pam Bondi and White House counsel David Warrington to handle the investigation. Even as Trump doubled down on his accusations, it is unclear how far Trump will push this effort, which would face certain legal challenges. It nonetheless reflects his fixation on Biden, who defeated him in 2020, an election that Trump never conceded and continues to falsely claim was rigged against him. In lobbing allegations against Biden on Thursday, Trump continued to insist that the 2020 election was stolen from him. Trump frequently suggests that Biden was wrong to use an autopen, a mechanical device that replicates a person's authentic signature. Although they've been used in the White House for decades, Trump claims that Biden's aides were usurping presidential authority. Biden issued pardons for his two brothers and his sister shortly before leaving office, hoping to shield them from potential prosecution under Trump, who had promised retribution during last year's campaign. Other Biden pardon recipients included members of a congressional committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. Trump often suggests that his political opponents should be investigated, and he has directed the Justice Department to look into people who have angered him over the years. They include Chris Krebs, a former cybersecurity official who disputed Trump's claims of a stolen election in 2020, and Miles Taylor, a former Department of Homeland Security official who wrote an anonymous op-ed sharply critical of the president in 2018. Meanwhile, House Oversight Chairman James Comer of Kentucky, a Republican, requested transcribed interviews with five Biden aides, alleging they had participated in a 'cover-up' that amounted to 'one of the greatest scandals in our nation's history.' 'These five former senior advisors were eyewitnesses to President Biden's condition and operations within the Biden White House,' Comer said in a statement. 'They must appear before the House Oversight Committee and provide truthful answers about President Biden's cognitive state and who was calling the shots.' Interviews were requested with White House senior advisers Mike Donilon and Anita Dunn, former White House chief of staff Ron Klain, former deputy chief of staff Bruce Reed and Steve Ricchetti, a former counselor to the president. Comer reiterated his call for Biden's physician, Kevin O'Connor, and former senior White House aides Annie Tomasini, Anthony Bernal, Ashley Williams and Neera Tanden to appear before the committee. He warned subpoenas would be issued this week if they refuse to schedule voluntary interviews. 'I think that people will start coming in the next two weeks,' Comer told reporters. He added that the committee would release a report with its findings, 'and we'll release the transcribed interviews, so it'll be very transparent.' Rep. Brandon Gill, a freshman Republican from Texas, said 'the American people didn't elect a bureaucracy to run the country,' said 'I think that the American people deserve to know the truth and they want to know the truth of what happened.' Democrats have dismissed the accusations as a distraction. 'Chairman Comer had his big shot in the last Congress to impeach Joe Biden and it was, of course, a spectacular flop,' said Rep. Jamie Raskin, the Maryland Democrat who served as the ranking member on the oversight committee in the previous Congress. 'And now he's just living off of a spent dream. It's over. And he should give up the whole thing.'
San Francisco Chronicle
an hour ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Jury deliberations begin in Harvey Weinstein's sex crimes retrial
NEW YORK (AP) — Jurors started deliberating Thursday in Harvey Weinstein 's New York sex crimes retrial, tasked with deciding — again — a case that encapsulated the #MeToo movement. The seven-woman, five-man jury is considering two counts of criminal sex act and one count of rape, each relating to a different accuser and a different date. In this case, the criminal sex act charge is the higher-degree felony. The jury got the case after a juror was replaced by an alternate after she couldn't come to court due to illness. Weinstein, 73, has pleaded not guilty. Nearly eight years ago, a series of sexual misconduct allegations against the Oscar-winning movie producer propelled the #MeToo movement. Some of those accusations later generated criminal charges and convictions in New York and California. The New York conviction from 2020 was subsequently overturned, leading to the retrial before a new jury and a different judge. Jurors heard more than five weeks of testimony, including lengthy and sometimes fiery questioning of Weinstein's three accusers in the case. Jessica Mann said he raped her in 2013, when she was trying to build an acting career. Miriam Haley accused him of forcibly performing oral sex on her in 2006, when she was looking for work in entertainment production. Kaja Sokola, who wasn't involved in Weinstein's first trial, told jurors that he forced oral sex on her, too, during 2006. At the time, she was a teenage fashion model trying to break into acting. 'They all had dreams of pursuing careers in the defendant's world, the entertainment industry,' prosecutor Nicole Blumberg told jurors in her closing argument Tuesday. She contended that Weinstein let the women think he was interested in their careers when what actually interested him were their bodies, and "he was going to have their bodies and touch their bodies whether they wanted him to or not.' Weinstein chose not to testify. His defense called other witnesses, including some former friends of Sokola's and Mann's. Weinstein's attorneys argued that all three accusers consented to Weinstein's advances because they wanted help with their Hollywood aims. All three stayed on friendly terms with him afterward, a point the defense emphasized. 'It's transactional, folks. Yes, he wants to fool around with them, and yes, they want something from him,' defense lawyer Arthur Aidala said in his summation Tuesday.
