“We have to do things to stop this,” Annapolis Mayor Gavin Buckley said after the country’s latest mass shooting
Three people were killed and three others were wounded in an Annapolis, Md., shooting on Sunday night that police say may have taken place at a graduation party.
Annapolis Police Chief Edward C. Jackson told reporters at a late-night news conference the shooting happened because of an “interpersonal dispute” and police were initially told the gathering at the house was for a graduation party.
No official motive has been released, and it’s unclear how the victims knew the unidentified suspect, who police say is in custody and referred to as “him.” The six victims were men, Jackson said, and no charges were filed yet as of late Sunday night.
has reached out to the Annapolis Police Department for more information but did not immediately receive a response on Monday morning. The shooter has not yet been identified and the department said in a statement the three surviving victims are in stable condition.
One victim was flown to the R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center at the University of Maryland, Baltimore.
“This is a fluid and ongoing investigation,” the statement added, asking for the public’s help in gathering more information about the shooting.
Officers responded to the home at about 8 p.m. local time, Jackson told reporters Sunday night. Jackson said officers found three people dead outside the house and three more who were wounded. The victims ranged in age from their “early 20s to about 50 years of age.”
Jackson said police believed an exchange of gunfire took place and that authorities recovered “at least one” weapon at the scene, “maybe more.”
“We’re still trying to determine everything that occurred,” Jackson said, speaking alongside Mayor Gavin Buckley.
“If you look around you, we’re in a very middle-class neighborhood in Annapolis, Maryland,” Buckley told the media gathered outside the house. “Tonight is an example of, yet again, senseless violence. People trying to resolve issues with guns. It is the most ridiculous thing that we can do as a society. We have to do things to stop this.”
Jackson said the shooting took place in a “stable” neighborhood but emphasized how commonplace mass shootings have become in the United States. At least 290 mass shootings have already taken place in in the U.S. in 2023, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which defines a mass shooting as a shooting with four or more victims.
Sunday’s mass shooting comes days after an 18 year old and his father were shot and killed while walking out of his high school graduation ceremony in Richmond, Virginia.
“This is unusual for this area,” Jackson said. “But no area is immune. We’re living in times now where the availability of handguns are plentiful right now and we have people who are willing to use them. That’s everywhere in this country right now.”