At least 140 people died in shootings across the US over the Fourth of July weekend
Shafaq News/ The return of mass shootings in America was felt over the Fourth of July weekend, as cities from Chicago to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, to Fort Worth, Texas, were gripped by gun violence.
The Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit that tracks shootings nationwide, recorded 375 shootings, including 18 mass shootings, in the US from Friday to Monday evening.
The spike was a dark reminder that as normal life resumes in the country, so too does gun violence.
The frequency of so-called mass shootings, which involve numerous injuries or fatalities, had briefly subsided in the 15 months since the coronavirus outbreak was declared a pandemic and offices, schools, and movie theaters closed their doors. Experts warn that the return of frequent mass shootings is imminent, so long as weapons designed to kill people quickly and in large numbers are widely available.
To be clear, gun violence was up last year through the pandemic, even though there were fewer mass shootings.
On Sunday, a clothing-store owner in West Philadelphia was holding a cookout outside his store when one or more gunmen fired as many as 100 shots into the crowd, killing the 23-year-old store owner and another man. The shooting happened while fireworks were being set off, making it hard to know where the bullets were coming from, NBC Philadelphia reported.
At least 92 people were shot, 16 of them killed, in what was the deadliest and most violent weekend this year in Chicago, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. In the early hours Monday, a person driving past fired on a group hanging out in a park on the South Side, killing two and wounding two, including a 12-year-old girl and a 13-year-old boy.
The definition of a mass shooting differs by source, but the Gun Violence Archive defines it as an incident in which four or more people are shot (not counting the shooter) in roughly the same time and place.
By this definition, at least 18 people died and 71 were injured in 18 mass shootings over Independence Day weekend.
Last year's Fourth of July weekend was also marred by violence with 26 mass shootings, the nonprofit reported.
Source: Insider
