Fourteen people were injured, one of them critically, in a shooting Wednesday evening after a fight broke out during an unsanctioned Juneteenth gathering by Lake Merritt in Oakland — which also devolved into a sideshow. This is the second Juneteenth shooting in Oakland in three years.
The shooting happened around 8:45 pm Wednesday, about a half hour after a sideshow began near the intersection of Grand Avenue and Bellevue Avenue. Oakland police say that a fight broke out on the 400 block of Grand Avenue, and as the crowd move toward the fight, shots rang out and people began scattering.
The numbers of those injured was initially said to be 16, but according to a subsequent police announcement it was revised down to 14, with one person listed in critical condition.
Police also later said that two arrests had been made in connection with the shooting.
This all happened amid a Juneteenth celebration in a park by the lake — Empowerment Park, and the area around the Pergola, where frequent informal gatherings took place during the pandemic — and the Chronicle reports via police that that there were about 5,000 people gathered there.
A shooting also occurred at a Juneteenth gathering by Lake Merritt in 2021 in which six people were injured and one 22-year-old San Francisco man was killed.
KTVU spoke to one attendee at Wednesday night's event, Tamia Robinson of Richmond, who said her friend had been killed in the shooting, but authorities have not confirmed that anyone was fatally shot.
Robinson said she arrived around 7 pm, and that by 8:45 the vibe had changed.
"We all came out here to celebrate our culture... our freedom," she tells KTVU. "You see people are still out here singing and dancing. This is not fun. Just two or three years ago this happened, and it seems to be a repeating cycle. There needs to be a change in the community."
Video posted to X shows multiple victims on sidewalks, and you can hear multiple shots being fired as people run for cover.
At 10:12 pm, Oakland police put out an alert to avoid the area of Grand Avenue near the I-580 on- and off-ramps, saying there had been a "mass casualty incident," with "multiple people shot and stabbed."
OAKLAND
— CHP BAY AREA TRAFFIC INCIDENTS (@AreaChp) June 20, 2024
AVOID THE AREA OF I-580 AT GRAND AVENUE.
OAKLAND POLICE AND OAKLAND FIRE ON SCENE OF A POSSIBLE MASS CAUSALITY INCIDENT ON GRAND AVENUE ADJACENT TO I-580.
MULTIPLE VICTIMS SHOT AND STABBED AT JUNETEENTH CELEBRATION.
There is no update on the condition of the victims at this time.
This post has been updated to show that 14 people were injured in the shooting.
Photo via Citizen
