At least 16 people have been injured and two killed in a mass shooting outside a Fort Myers nightclub that hosted a teen night in the early hours of Monday morning [July 25].
Officers were called to the scene about 12:30 A.M and arrived to the parking lot with multiple victims sustained by gunshot wounds, some minor and some fatal. Some victims were as young as 12 and gunfire was let off as families were picking their children up from the teen event, hosted by Club Blu.
Club Blue posted to their Facebook account: “We are deeply sorry for all involved. We tried to give the teens what we thought was a safe place to have a good time.” The club says there was armed security for the event where kids between the ages of 12-17 where in attendance, reports NBC News.
Victims were taken to nearby hospital, Lee Memorial. Of the 16 victims, one died after being admitted and two others were sent to intensive care. Another victim eventually died also, according to police. The victims who were shot were between the ages of 12 and 27. The two people that were killed were both males.
One of the victims’ mother, Syreeta Gary, said in an interview with a reporter from FOX4, a local news station in Fort Myers, that her daughter was dodging bullets but her friend was shot in the leg. She says, “I just thank God that my daughter is O.K. because she could’ve been shot. Her dodging bullets, running, dropping between cars, it’s ridiculous that these kids have to go through this. They can’t enjoy themselves because you have other people with criminalistic minds, and they just want to terrorize people.”
This is the second mass shooting that has happened in Florida. Just last month Omar Mateen killed 49 people and wounded more than 50 others at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, holding the clubgoers hostage and later killed by Orlando police in a shootout. The shooting was the worst mass shooting in United States history.
