Nine people were fatally shot and over two dozen more were injured after someone opened fire in Dayton’s historic Oregon District on Sunday, August 4, according to the Dayton Police Department. It marks the second mass shooting in the U.S. in less than 14 hours.
It was 1 a.m. when the perpetrator, clad in body armor and carrying a .223-caliber rifle with additional high-capacity magazines, began firing on the crowded district popular with both tourists and locals alike, Mayor Nan Whaley said at a Sunday morning news conference. Authorities responded quickly — police shot and killed the shooter “in less than a minute,” Whaley said.
Per the New York Times, victims included the perpetrator’s sister, Megan Betts. She was 22. Monica E. Brickhouse, 39; Nicholas P. Cumer, 25; Derrick R. Fudge, 57; Thomas J. McNichols; Lois L. Oglesby, 27; Saeed Saleh, 38; Logan Turner, 30; and Beatrice N. Warren-Curtis, 36, were also killed by the perpetrator. Six of the victims were Black; the other three were white. Per the Times, authorities called it “unlikely” that the perpetrator would have shot at people based on race.
“While this is a terribly sad day for our city, I am amazed by the quick response of Dayton police that saved literally hundreds of lives,” Mayor Whaley said.
Authorities believe that the shooter, who was a white man, acted on his own; the investigation is still ongoing. According to the Washington Post, state and local police and the FBI are still interviewing dozens of people. They have not speculated on the gunman’s motive and have not said if the gunman was targeting any specific person or place, Police Lt. Col. Matt Carper told the Post.
“As a mayor, this is a day that we all dread happening,” Whaley said in the news conference. “And certainly what’s very sad as I’ve gotten messages from cities across the country is that so many of us have gone through it.”
Whaley added that Dayton is the 250th mass shooting this year, many of which plagued the country just this week. Dayton’s shooting comes less than a day after a perpetrator attacked a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, killing 20 people; less than a week after a gunman opened fire on a garlic festival in Gilroy, California, killing three and wounding more than a dozen more; and one week after a shooter killed one person and injured 11 more in Brooklyn, New York.
President Trump tweeted on Sunday morning that “FBI, local and state law enforcement are working together in El Paso and in Dayton, Ohio,” although law enforcement officials say it is still unclear if there is any connection between the two shootings.
“God bless the people of El Paso Texas,” President Trump tweeted on Sunday morning. “God bless the people of Dayton, Ohio.”
There have been nearly 90 people wounded or killed in mass shootings in the U.S. this month alone, according to Mass Shooting Tracker. It is August 4.
