LAST UPDATE | 16 Apr 2023
US PRESIDENT JOE Biden has offered his condolences to the families of those killed in shootings that took place this weekend, in the latest episode of deadly gun violence to grip the country.
At least four people were killed and 28 more were injured in a shooting last night at a teen birthday party in Alabama.
Two people were also shot dead in Louisville, Kentucky, after someone opened fire on a crowd in Chickasaw Park yesterday evening, injuring four others.
Biden has made a fresh call for increased gun control in the wake of the tragic deaths.
The President said in a statement issued this evening: “What has our nation come to when children cannot attend a birthday party without fear? When parents have to worry every time their kids walk out the door to school, to the movie theater, or to the park?
“Guns are the leading killer of children in America, and the numbers are rising – not declining.
“This is outrageous and unacceptable. Americans agree and want lawmakers to act on common sense gun safety reforms. Instead, this past week Americans saw national Republican elected leaders stand alongside the NRA in a race to the bottom on dangerous laws that further erode gun safety.
“Our communities need and deserve better. Local news reports in Alabama said the shooting occurred at a Sweet 16 party at a dance studio in Dadeville, a small town northeast of the state capital Montgomery, with at least 20 people shot.”
Biden also reaffirmed his vow that he stands ready to “work across the aisle in good faith on legislation that will save lives”.
He said that it is within the power of Congress to require safe storage of firearms, to introduce background checks for all gun sales, and to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.
”There were four lives tragically lost in this incident, and there’s been a multitude of injuries,” Sergeant Jeremy Burkett, a spokesman for the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency (ALEA), told reporters Sunday.
Annette Allen told the Montgomery Advertiser that her grandson Phil Dowdell was among those who died: he had been celebrating his sister Alexis’s 16th birthday when gunfire ripped through the party.
“He was a very, very humble child. Never messed with anybody. Always had a smile on his face,” Allen said of her grandson, a high school senior due to graduate within weeks. She said Dowdell’s mother was also shot and wounded.
“Everybody’s grieving,” Allen said of the small community of some 3,000 residents.
More than 12 hours after the tragedy, neither Burkett nor other law enforcement officials provided any details on who may have perpetrated the shooting and why, whether a suspect has been detained or identified, or specifically how many people were injured and what their ages are.
“We can’t share anything further at this time,” the sergeant said, adding only that “it was tied to a birthday party.”
Local media and witnesses have said several wounded people, many of them teens, were transported to local hospitals for medical attention.
Dadeville Chief of Police Jonathan Floyd called the town “a tight-knit community full of wonderful people.”
ALEA said its State Bureau of Investigations has launched a probe together with Dadeville police and federal agencies including the FBI.
Television station WRBL of nearby Columbus, Georgia reported heavy police activity overnight and crime scene tape around a building in Dadeville, where it said white sheets could be seen covering parts of the floor.
State leaders took to Twitter Sunday offering prayers and decrying violence but they did not provide details on what happened.
“This morning, I grieve with the people of Dadeville and my fellow Alabamians,” state Governor Kay Ivey posted. “Violent crime has NO place in our state, and we are staying closely updated by law enforcement as details emerge.”
US Senator Tommy Tuberville of Alabama, called the shooting “heartbreaking.”
The United States, a country of around 330 million people, is awash with some 400 million guns, and deadly mass shootings are a regular occurrence.
The latest deaths came on the 16th anniversary of the deadliest school shooting on record in the United States, in which 32 people were killed at Virginia Tech in 2007.
Separately, police confirmed two people were killed and four others wounded in a shooting late Saturday at a crowded park in Louisville, Kentucky, the same city where a bank employee slaughtered five people at his workplace last Monday.
There have been 163 mass shootings in the United States so far in 2023, according to the Gun Violence Archive. The non-profit group defines a mass shooting as having a minimum of four victims shot, either injured or killed, excluding any shooter.
Efforts to tighten gun controls have for years run up against opposition from Republicans, staunch defenders of the constitutional right to bear arms.
The political paralysis endures despite widespread outrage over recurring shootings.
-Additional reporting from Eimer McAuley.
© Agence France-Presse
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