A mass shooting on Friday night at an unauthorized car show at Young Park in Las Cruces, New Mexico left a total of 18 people shot and three teen boys dead, Breitbart News reported.
According to police, two groups "with a history of problems with each other” showed up to the car show and an argument ensued between them.
The argument escalated to a shooting around 10 p.m, and police said they collected 50 to 60 shell casings at the scene after the shooting occurred.
“Today, we mourn a tragic, a senseless, a horrible event that happened in our city,” Las Cruces Mayor Eric Enriquez said on Saturday.
Las Cruces Police Chief Jeremy Story said that because of staffing issues, no police officers patrolled the park during the show, which had about 200 people attending.
“That area’s been trouble with crime more so in recent years,” Chief Story said. “They’ve kind of ebbed and flowed, partly with weather and other things. They’ve become an issue and dealt with, done some projects, they become less of an issue and then they pop back up again. Definitely a problem.”
Story said the gathering itself wasn't the problem, just the illegal activities and the presence of numerous firearms that can occur.
“If they were just gathering and nothing was occurring that was illegal, I have no problem with that. The problem is, what tends to occur is a lot of illegal behavior with the vehicles and then also, in this case, there were firearms throughout this entire event. Some that were used in the shooting and just people with firearms willie-nilly,” said Chief Story.
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D) said of the shooting, “These tragedies have to end. The amount of guns that find their ways into public parks and schools and churches and grocery stores and parties and cars must end.”
As a Democrat, Grisham probably thinks taking everyone's guns away is the answer.
New Mexico is an open carry state, but a license is needed for concealed carry.
It is a "must-issue" state, which means that if the individual meets the qualifications for concealed carry, they must be issued a license.
Still, it's important to realize that incidents like this are exceedingly rare, which is why the news covers them when they do happen.
