2 women killed, 5 people hurt in shooting during barbecue at upstate New York park; ‘cowards’ at large
(NEW YORK) — Two women were killed and five other people were hurt in a shooting at a barbecue in an upstate New York park, according to police.
Hundreds of people, including children, were in Rochester’s Maplewood Park when rounds were fired from multiple weapons shortly after 6 p.m. Sunday, Rochester police said at a news conference.
The five people who were hurt suffered non-life-threatening injuries, police said Monday.
Tyasia Manning, 25, and Phylicia Council, 34, were killed in the shooting, police said.
Manning was a city employee who helped young people “become their best selves,” Rochester Mayor Malik Evans said.
“These were innocent victims,” he said.
“As I looked at that crime scene last night, I saw a stroller, people’s shoes. Our people, our residents, should be able to enjoy the summer in a park, period,” Evans said. “But all too often, we have individuals in this community that are unmitigated cowards — that are OK with shooting women. And two of those women lost their life.”
“Maplewood Park is known for its beautiful views, beautiful events. … It should not be remembered by being a place that is marred by violence,” Evans said.
No arrests have been made.
Police urge anyone with information or video from the scene to call the Major Crimes Unit at 585-428-7157 or email MajorCrimes@CityofRochester.gov.
(NEW YORK) — A judge in New York on Monday banned former National Rifle Association leader Wayne LaPierre from serving in a role at the NRA or affiliate organizations for 10 years after he was held liable for financial mismanagement of the nation’s most well-known gun lobby.
The judge gave the NRA itself and the New York Attorney General’s office one week to discuss potential reforms.
“The NRA and its senior leaders broke the law, and funneled millions of dollars in cash and lavish perks to themselves, their families, and NRA insiders,” said Attorney General Letitia James. “The damages portion of the case we presented, as well as the earlier trial before the jury, demonstrated that the NRA had a stunning lack of accountability and it’s leaders engaged in illegality and self-dealing. As a result of this case, Wayne LaPierre will be banned from the NRA for 10 years for spearheading this fraud, and the court called for additional proposed reforms to the NRA. After years of corruption, the NRA and its senior leaders are finally being held accountable.”
After five days of deliberations in February, a jury in New York held the National Rifle Association liable for financial mismanagement and found that LaPierre, the group’s former CEO, corruptly ran the nation’s most prominent gun rights group.
LaPierre and a senior executive at the NRA were ordered to pay a combined $6.35 million “for abusing the system and breaking our laws,” James, whose office brought the lawsuit against the organization, said following the verdict.
The jury determined that LaPierre’s violation of his duties cost the NRA $5.4 million in damages, though he already repaid more than $1 million to the organization. He must pay $4.35 million, the New York Attorney General’s Office said at the time.
The New York Attorney General’s Office sued the NRA and its senior management in 2020, claiming they misappropriated millions of dollars to fund personal benefits — including private jets, family vacations and luxury goods. The accusations came at the end of a three-year investigation into the NRA, which is registered in New York as a nonprofit charitable corporation.
(NEW YORK) — The suspected shooter in the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump visited a gun club dozens of times in the year leading up to the attack, including on holidays, according to records newly obtained by Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, as dramatic body camera footage of the incident also emerges.
Records obtained by Grassley’s office and released Thursday show Thomas Matthew Crooks’ “intense preparation in the months prior to his attempted assassination of the former president,” Grassley’s office said in a statement.
The records were provided by the Clairton Sportsmen’s Club Jefferson Hills, Pennsylvania, pursuant to a congressional request, Grassley’s office said.
The records released by Grassley’s office show that since establishing a membership at the gun club on Aug. 10, 2023 — less than a year before the July 13 assassination attempt — Crooks visited the range a total of 43 times, including 20 times in his first four months of membership.
Crooks spent several holidays at the range, including Christmas Day, Valentine’s Day and Halloween, the records released by Grassley’s office show.
Most of his visits — 80% — were spent on rifle practice, according to Grassley’s office.
“He focused almost exclusively on the rifle range throughout 2024,” Grassley’s office said.
The Clairton Sportsmen’s Club previously confirmed to ABC News that Crooks visited the gun club for the last time on July 12 — the day before the rally. He visited the range at 2:45 p.m. local time that day, according to the records released by Grassley’s office.
Crooks, 20, is suspected of firing as many as eight rounds from the roof of a building outside the security perimeter of the rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, before being killed by a Secret Service counter-sniper.
Body camera footage released Thursday shows the moment when police first confronted the gunman. An officer is seen being hoisted onto the roof, encountering the shooter and then falling back.
“This close, bro!” the officer yells. “Dude, he turned around on me. He’s straight up!”
The video shows officers taking up heavy arms and race toward the building.
“This building. He’s on top of this building,” an officer calls out. “He’s got a bookbag. He’s got mad s—, AR, laying down.”
As officers stream toward the building, other officers are seen offering a boost to the rooftop.
“Next, next, next,” an officer says in an apparent attempt to quickly get more officers into position.
By then, though, Crooks is dead.
“One in custody. AGR building south. Rooftop,” an officer is overheard saying.
Later, in the calmer aftermath, the officers questioned how a gunman was able to access a rooftop firing position fewer than 400 feet from the podium where Trump had been speaking.
“I told them, post f—— guys over here,” one officer is heard saying. “Why were we not on the roof?”
Butler County released the footage Thursday in response to public records requests from news agencies including ABC News.
One rally spectator was killed and two injured in the assassination attempt. Trump also suffered a graze wound to his ear. A motive in the assassination attempt remains under investigation.
Ronald Rowe, the acting director of the Secret Service, said last week that video from that day affirmed there should’ve been better coverage.
“We should have had better protection for the protectee. We should have had better coverage on that roofline,” Rowe told reporters.
FBI Deputy Director Paul Abbate told a Senate panel last month that the investigation remains focused on motive, identifying any potential co-conspirators and building out the timeline of the shooter’s actions.
A new bomb threat prompted officials Sunday at Clark State College in Springfield, Ohio, to close the campus this week and hold classes virtually, the school said.
Clark officials said it received an email of a bomb threat to the Springfield campus on Sunday, a day after it received another emailed threat on Saturday threatening a possible shooting.
“We took immediate action with the Springfield Police Department and they have ensured our campus is secure and safe,” the college said in a statement.
The college said that “out of an abundance of caution,” it will conduct all instruction virtually and close all of its campuses for the week of Sept. 16-20, adding, “We will always prioritize the safety and wellness of our students, employees and community.”
“We understand the anxiety that such incidents can cause and we are treating this matter with the utmost seriousness and care,” Clark officials said. “As a proactive measure, Springfield Police will also increase their security presence on campus, and we are working with our wellness team and partners to provide additional counseling services.”
Bomb threats made on Saturday targeted three medical facilities, an unspecified fourth facility and Wittenberg University, a small private liberal arts college in Springfield, officials said.
Wittenberg officials canceled all activities scheduled for Sunday due to a threat that “targeted Haitian members of our community,” the university said in an alert on Saturday.
“Wittenberg University is currently taking extreme precautions following an email that threatened a potential shooting on-campus tomorrow,” the university said in a statement on Saturday.
An FBI spokesperson confirmed to ABC News that the FBI “is working in coordination with the Springfield Police Department and Wittenberg University to determine the credibility of recent threats, share information, and take appropriate investigative action. We encourage the public to remain vigilant and to report anything they consider suspicious to law enforcement.”
As a result of the threats, local police conducted sweeps of the colleges and medical facilities targeted and cleared them. Some have already reopened, a police official told ABC News.
Springfield Regional Medical Center, Ohio Valley Surgical Hospital and Kettering Health Springfield were listed by authorities as targets.
The Springfield Police Division has beefed up its staffing as it deals with threats stemming from unsubstantiated claims about the Haitian migrant community.
Two elementary schools were evacuated and a middle school was closed on Friday in the wake of a threat sent via email in Springfield, according to the school district and the mayor.
The elementary schools released students to their parents, officials said.
It’s unclear if the person who sent Friday’s threat is the same person who sent the other threats, Springfield Mayor Rob Rue told ABC News.
On Thursday morning, bomb threats were sent via email “to multiple agencies and media outlets” in the city, according to the city commission office.
Explosive-detecting K-9s helped police clear multiple facilities listed in the threat, including two elementary schools, City Hall and a few driver’s license bureaus, Springfield Police Chief Allison Elliott told reporters. The county court facilities were also cleared “out of an abundance of caution,” she said.
The FBI is working with local police to help identify the source of the threat, Elliott said.
The mayor said there’s a lot of fear in Springfield in the wake of the threats.
“This is a very concerning time for our citizens, and frankly, a lot of people are tired of just, you know, the things that have been spread about our community that are just negative and not true. We need help, not hate,” Rue told ABC News on Friday.
The mayor said he believes these threats are directly connected to the baseless rumors spread online in the wake of viral social media posts claiming Haitian migrants were abducting people’s pets in Springfield in order to eat them. The rumors were amplified by right-wing politicians, including former President Donald Trump and his running mate Sen. JD Vance.
“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs,” Trump said at Tuesday night’s presidential debate. “The people that came in, they’re eating the cats, they’re eating, they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”
A spokesperson for the city of Springfield told ABC News these claims are false, and that there have been “no credible reports or specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals in the immigrant community.”
“Additionally, there have been no verified instances of immigrants engaging in illegal activities such as squatting or littering in front of residents’ homes,” the spokesperson said. “Furthermore, no reports have been made regarding members of the immigrant community deliberately disrupting traffic.”
The mayor added, “Your pets are safe in Springfield.”
Springfield estimates there are around 12,000 to 15,000 immigrants living in the county; migrants have been drawn to the region because of the low cost of living and work opportunities, according to the city. The rapid rise in population has strained housing, health care and school resources, according to the city. City officials also said the migrants are in the country legally and that many are recipients of Temporary Protected Status.
The Haitian Bridge Alliance condemned the “baseless and inflammatory” claims about Haitian migrants, arguing they “not only perpetuate harmful stereotypes but also contribute to the dangerous stigmatization of immigrant communities, particularly Black immigrants from the Republic of Haiti.”
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, who dispelled the rumors this week, said the state would send more resources to Springfield.
The mayor stressed, “Anybody on the national stage that takes a microphone, needs to understand what they could do to communities like Springfield with their words. They’re not helping. They’re hurting communities like ours with their words.”
ABC News’ Bill Hutchinson contributed to this report.