A list of Kentuckians who have died because of domestic violence, ranging in age from 19 to 73. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Sarah Ladd)

If you or someone you know has experienced domestic violence, call the National Sexual Assault Telephone Hotline at 1-800-656-4673. Call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233.?

You can also contact any of Kentucky’s 15 domestic violence programs.?

FRANKFORT — Kentucky must examine its gun laws to make sure it’s doing all it can to protect survivors of domestic violence, Gov. Andy Beshear said Tuesday.?

His comments came after he signed a proclamation in the Capitol Rotunda making October 2024 Domestic Violence Awareness Month.?

He joined advocates from ZeroV (formerly known as the Kentucky Coalition Against Domestic Violence) and others to honor 26 lives lost in recent years to intimate partner violence — including Erica Riley, who was fatally shot outside the Hardin County Justice Center in August.

After 2 women die in ‘ambush’ outside Hardin courthouse, what can Kentucky do better?

Beshear said Kentucky needs to provide “real protection” for people leaving abusive situations.?

“We have sadly seen far too much violence after someone takes out (a protective order), and we’ve got to make sure that we are filling all of those holes,” Beshear told reporters. “We’ve got to look at transportation. We’ve got to look at ways to keep people’s current location from reaching their perpetrator, and we’ve got to look at how we navigate the judicial system to where that person doesn’t have to face their perpetrator … every so often in court.”?

Riley was at the courthouse on the morning of Aug. 19 for a hearing on her emergency protective order. Police say the man who she was seeking protection from shot her and her mother, Janet Rylee, in an “ambush” in the courthouse parking lot right before the hearing. They both died.?

“It’s important that we have that system that provides everyone their day in court,” Beshear said, “but at the same time, doesn’t make someone face their abuser face to face, over and over.”?

That could be accomplished virtually, he said, an idea supported by the head of the domestic violence shelter in Elizabethtown, where Riley died. He also said the state “ought to look at” how to uniformly provide court escorts to people headed into hearings for protective orders.?

“We know we had a shooting outside of one of our courthouses where someone should be safe,” Beshear said. “And so whether that’s looking at where the parking lots are, how it’s designed, whether we have other entrances for those involved in these types of cases, or whether an escort in and out would work, we don’t want it to happen again. So the most important thing is we figure out a way to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”?

Beshear also said Kentucky must have a cultural shift in how it views domestic and intimate partner violence.?

“We’ve got far too much toxic masculinity, far too many people speaking in violent terms,” he said. “We should show our families what being a responsible adult is, and that … committing acts of violence doesn’t make you a man, it makes you a monster.”?

Beshear has previously voiced support for a “red flag” law, which would allow temporary restrictions on gun possession by individuals deemed a danger to themselves or others.

Coercive control

The gathering also heard a Kentucky lawmaker call for adding coercive control to Kentucky’s protective order law. Rep. Stephanie Dietz, R-Edgewood, said she will sponsor a bill to help survivors access “court assistance earlier in the process.”?

Dietz’s legislation is a key piece of policy advocates who work in violence prevention support.?

Currently, protective orders are available in Kentucky to people who have experienced physical violence or face immediate threat of physical violence. But some survivors face a more nuanced abuse, like loss of financial and medical autonomy, isolation, surveillance and more.?

“Most folks view domestic violence as that battering, that physical assault,” Angela Yannelli, the CEO of ZeroV, previously told the Lantern. “You’ll see the signs, the billboards, with the black eye … that happens. But what we think is happening a lot more, that we’re not able to see in the homes, are these controls.”?

Coercive control is a “huge indicator” of violence, Christy Burch, the CEO of the ION Center for violence prevention in Northern Kentucky, previously told the Lantern. In adding it to the emergency protective order (EPO) statute, she said, “we could save lives.”??

“Being able to recognize coercive control as a piece of intimate partner violence, or even a lead into intimate partner violence,” Burch said, “would be very important to getting ahead of this issue … not just responding after violence has already occurred.”

Not a ‘private issue’?

Andrea Robinson, president of the ZeroV board of directors, told the gathering that? Kentucky must break the “norm of silence” when it comes to domestic violence.?

“The current social norm of silence is based on the belief that intimate partner violence is a private issue, that it is between a couple, or … that it only affects those individuals in the relationship,” said Robinson. “The norm of silence only serves to hurt, isolate, shame and stigmatize survivors, making it harder for them to flee an abusive partner.”??

Breaking that can include checking on neighbors and loved ones, wearing purple to raise awareness of domestic violence and sharing resources with people who may need them, Robinson said.?

In 2022, about half of Kentucky women — 45.3% — and around 35.5% of men had experienced intimate partner violence — or threat of it — in their lifetimes, the Lantern has reported. ?

In 2023, that number decreased to 44.5% of women and 32.9% of men.?

Across the state in 2024, ZeroV programs provided emergency shelter to 2,788 people, including 1,120 children, and provided 336,145 total services, it says.?

“In Kentucky, we don’t tolerate domestic violence,” Beshear said. “It is every single one of our obligations to say something when we see it, to get over that thought that it’s private.”??

Shawn "Mickey" Stines has resigned as Letcher County sheriff and faces a murder charge. (Leslie County Detention Center)

The Eastern Kentucky sheriff charged with murdering a judge entered a not guilty plea Wednesday and was put on notice by Gov. Andy Beshear that if he does not resign by Friday the governor will act to remove him.?

Letcher County Sheriff Shawn “Mickey” Stines, 43, appeared remotely for his first appearance since District Judge Kevin Mullins, 54, was gunned down Sept. 19 at? the Letcher County Courthouse. Stines surrendered to authorities at the courthouse and was charged with first degree murder.

Stines told Special Judge Rupert Wilhoit III he does not have a lawyer but was accompanied by attorney Josh Miller, director of the state Department of Public Advocacy’s capital trial branch.

Beshear’s office on Wednesday released a letter to Stines from its general counsel, C. Travis Mayo, sent in care of the Leslie County jailer. The letter asks Stines to tender his resignation by the end of Friday, and says that if he does not, Beshear will “move forward with removal” under a Kentucky law.

Stines is jailed at the Leslie County Detention Center.

Shawn "Mickey" Stines has resigned as Letcher County sheriff and faces a murder charge. (Leslie County Detention Center)

Letcher County Sheriff Shawn “Mickey” Stines, charged with murdering a judge in his chambers last week, will face arraignment Wednesday morning in Carter County.

Stines is jailed in the Leslie County Detention Center.

And he’s still sheriff of Letcher County.

“He still is the sheriff until he would actually resign or be removed,”? said Jerry Wagner, executive director of the Kentucky Sheriffs’ Association. “Once you’re elected, you are elected through an election cycle.”?

Wagner said the situation facing Letcher County is unlike any he’s seen.

County sheriffs in Kentucky have wide-ranging powers to enforce the laws of the state along with carrying out a number of lesser-known but important duties, including tax collection, vehicle inspections and providing security for local court proceedings.?

Wagner, who served as Fleming County sheriff for nearly 20 years, said it was customary for a chief deputy to take over his duties when he was unable to perform them.

WHJL in Johnson City, Tennessee, reported a sign on the door of the Letcher County sheriff’s office said it would be closed until Oct. 1. The police chief for the county seat of Whitesburg told the TV station local law enforcement and Kentucky State Police were taking calls and responding to emergencies.

The Letcher County clerk’s office is open. The courts are set to reopen Monday, Sept. 30, with all court proceedings being rescheduled.?

Kentucky State Police Trooper Matt Gayheart, public affairs officer for KSP Post 13 which serves Letcher County, told the Lantern it’s his understanding the Letcher County Sheriff’s Office is planning to install an interim head, though he didn’t know if an interim leader has been named. Attempts by the Lantern to reach the Letcher County Sheriff’s Office were unsuccessful.?

Asked what power Stines has as sheriff while in custody, Gayheart said it’s a hard question to answer. “His involvement with the actual office itself, I don’t know how much control or the influence he would have on them,” Gayheart said.

Stines, 43, will be arraigned remotely Wednesday.

He is charged with firing multiple shots and killing Letcher County District Court Judge Kevin Mullins, 54, after an argument at the Letcher County Courthouse on Sept. 19. Stines surrendered without incident at the courthouse. The Mountain Eagle of Whitesburg has reported the shooting was recorded on video in the judge’s office.

Chief Regional Judge Rupert Wilhoit of Grayson was appointed as a special judge in the case by Supreme Court Chief Justice Laurance VanMeter. Wilhoit’s court is more than 100 miles north of Whitesburg.

Under Kentucky law, Gov. Andy Beshear has the power to remove a peace officer for “neglect of duty.” Alternatively, the Kentucky legislature has the power to impeach and convict elected officials to remove an official from office, which lawmakers did in 2023 with a former commonwealth’s attorney.?

Days before the alleged shooting, Stines gave an eight-hour deposition in a federal court case alleging a former Letcher County deputy forced a woman to have sex in lieu of paying court fees the woman couldn’t afford. Stines is a defendant in the suit for allegedly failing to properly supervise the deputy. It has been stayed in light of the criminal charge against Stines.?

Kentucky’s chief medical examiner and state crime lab staff have confirmed through a DNA analysis the body found near the site of the Interstate 75 shootings in Laurel County is the shooting suspect Joseph Couch.?

Chief Medical Examiner Bill Ralston in a Friday statement said DNA testing of the body’s soft tissue was inconclusive because of “extreme decomposition of the body,” but further tests of the body’s bone confirmed it was Couch. Ralston previously said the cause of death was consistent with a gunshot wound to the head. The official autopsy won’t be available until toxicology tests are finished.?

“I want to recognize the medical examiner’s office and KSP crime lab for working together and being diligent in obtaining positive identification so the commonwealth can move forward from this tragic situation,” Ralston said in his statement.?

The shooting along Interstate 75 in Laurel County wounded five people, who all survived their injuries, and led more than a dozen law enforcement agencies on a manhunt through rugged terrain that lasted nearly two weeks searching for Couch. A couple searching for Couch while live streaming on YouTube had originally found Couch’s body near the vicinity of the shooting.??

Portion of a flyer issued by law enforcement on Sept. 8, the day after the shootings. (Source: FBI)

Law enforcement officials in a Wednesday evening news conference said they think a body found near where five people were shot on Interstate 75 in Laurel County is the alleged shooter.?

Kentucky State Police Commissioner Phillip Burnett Jr. said confirmation that the body was Joseph Couch, 32, would have to await an autopsy Thursday in Frankfort. Burnett said a weapon was found near the body but did not offer details on how long officials think the body had been there or how Couch died.?

“Sometimes these things take time, and that’s what this one did. But this was about perseverance, that we did not give up,” Burnett said. “We brought it to a successful conclusion.”?

WKYT in Lexington reported that a couple who had been hunting for Couch, Fred and Sheila McCoy, said they found the body Wednesday after observing an increase in vultures near the area. They told WKYT that they began looking for Couch in the dense woods as a “date night” idea and have been live-streaming their searches on a YouTube channel called “Hatfields and McCoys Museum Adventures.”

Fred McCoy told WKYT they were hoping to claim the $35,000 reward offered for information leading to Couch’s arrest but also wanted to help restore normalcy to shaken residents. Schools in southern Kentucky had canceled classes and football games in response to Couch’s disappearance after the shootings.?

Burnett said the couple who had found the body would be receiving $15,000 from the Laurel County Crime Stoppers and another $10,000 from a private donation.?

Laurel County Sheriff John Root said he wanted prayers for the victims of the shooting along with prayers for Couch’s family.?

“He’s a human being, and I wish we could have took him alive. It just so happened that we didn’t,” Root said.?

Couch is charged with attempted murder and assault for allegedly shooting at cars from a ledge overlooking I-75, shutting down the interstate for hours on the evening of Sept. 7. All five people who were wounded in the shooting have been released from hospitals.?

Couch left behind a car and an AR-15 rifle he had legally purchased the day of the shooting. He texted his ex-wife that he was “going to kill a lot of people” and then himself.

The shooting set off a manhunt over 28,000 acres that employed state and federal law enforcement, dogs, drones, a National Guard Black Hawk helicopter and surveillance cameras. On Tuesday, officials announced a shift in the focus of the search to increasing police presence in nearby communities.

Portion of a flyer issued by law enforcement on Sept. 8, the day after the shootings. (Source: FBI)

Kentucky officials on Tuesday announced a shift in the search for the suspect in the Sept. 7 shootings on Interstate 75 to focus on increasing police presence and patrols in nearby communities.

Gov. Andy Behsear said that on the manhunt’s 11th day there remains only a low probability of finding Joseph Couch, 32, in the Daniel Boone National Forest. Monitoring of the forest will continue by aircraft and surveillance cameras placed in the 28,000 acres that have been searched, officials said.

Beshear said the main goal now is to reassure people they’re safe and can go about their lives.

“It’s a reallocation not a reduction,” Beshear said during a noon briefing by state, federal and local law enforcement in London.

Couch, who left behind a car and an AR-15 rifle, is believed to have fled into the forest. Schools in southern Kentucky canceled classes and football games in response. Laurel County schools reopened Tuesday for the first time since the shootings.

Couch is charged with attempted murder and assault for allegedly shooting at cars from a ledge overlooking I-75. Five people were wounded; all have been released from hospitals.?

FBI Special Agent Quincy Barnett said the fugitive search will continue from the bureau’s London office.

Beshear advised against using the area of the national forest under surveillance for recreation, saying images picked up by surveillance cameras could prompt a law enforcement response.

U.S. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle testifies before the House Oversight and Accountability Committee on July 22, 2024. The beleaguered leader of the agency has pledged cooperation with all investigations into the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump, though members of Congress from both parties have called for her to resign. (Photo by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Congressional lawmakers on both sides of the aisle berated U.S. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle on Monday over the agency’s failures to prevent the attempted assassination against former President Donald J. Trump, urging her to resign amid dissatisfaction with her testimony.

Nine days since a 20-year-old shooter killed one rallygoer and injured two others with an AR-15 style rifle at a Trump campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, a slew of bipartisan investigations and actions have sprung up in an attempt to get to the bottom of the shooting that nearly killed the 2024 GOP presidential nominee.?The gunman was killed at the scene.

“The Secret Service has a zero-fail mission, but it failed on July 13 and in the days leading up to the rally,” Rep. James Comer, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, said in an opening statement to the panel’s lengthy hearing on the attempted assassination.

“The Secret Service has thousands of employees and a significant budget, but it has now become the face of incompetence,” Comer, a Kentucky Republican, said.

Cheatle, who testified after Comer subpoenaed her, said the assassination attempt is “the most significant operational failure of the Secret Service in decades” and acknowledged that she has taken, and will continue to take, accountability.

“I am responsible for leading the agency, and I am responsible for finding the answers to how this event occurred and making sure that it doesn’t happen again,” she added.

Both parties critical in questioning

Republicans and Democrats expressed extreme dissatisfaction over Cheatle’s answers, with Comer and ranking Democrat Jamie Raskin of Maryland calling on Cheatle to resign in a joint letter following the hearing.

The two said Cheatle “failed to provide answers to basic questions regarding that stunning operational failure and to reassure the American people that the Secret Service has learned its lessons and begun to correct its systemic blunders and failures.”

Lawmakers grilled Cheatle on how the gunman was able to execute the attack and access the roof where he conducted the shooting, how Trump was allowed to enter the stage with a “suspicious person” being identified and why she has not yet resigned from her post.

“Director Cheatle, because Donald Trump is alive —?and thank God he is — you look incompetent. If Donald Trump had been killed, you would have looked culpable,” said GOP Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio, who chairs the U.S. House Intelligence Committee.

Cheatle’s testimony

During the hearing, Cheatle noted that she was answering questions she’s able to answer “based on the fact that there are multiple ongoing investigations.”

However, throughout the hearing, Cheatle did disclose that the Secret Service was alerted “somewhere between two and five times” about a “suspicious individual” prior to the shooting.

“You’re full of s— today. You’re just being completely dishonest,” GOP South Carolina Rep. Nancy Mace said while asking Cheatle a series of “yes” or “no” questions, including whether this was a “colossal failure.”

Rep. Melanie Stansbury, a New Mexico Democrat, said Cheatle’s answers were “completely unsatisfactory.”

“How could this happen? … We need answers not just for the family members of the gentleman who was killed and those who were injured, but we need answers for our democracy, because as others have stated here today, we are in a highly politically charged environment right now,” she said.

Rep. Byron Donalds was among the myriad lawmakers calling on Cheatle to step down, saying: “You do need to be fired immediately, and it is because this is gross incompetence.”

“This is a joke, and Director, you’re in charge, and that’s why you need to go,” Donalds, a Florida Republican, said.

GOP Rep. Lisa McClain of Michigan also voiced her frustration over Cheatle’s answers.

“If you’re gonna lead, you need to lead,” McClain said. “If you wanna be in charge, then answer the question, or step aside and have someone with the courage and the guts to answer to the American people the questions that they deserve answers to.”

Cheatle also took heat after saying that they were targeting an internal investigation to be complete within 60 days — a timeline that did not sit well with the committee.

Cheatle pointed out a number of Office of Inspector General investigations and the FBI’s ongoing criminal investigation remain in progress while the agency conducted its own internal investigation.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, noted that November’s elections are just more than 100 days away.

“So the notion of a report coming out in 60 days when the threat environment is so high in the United States — irrespective of party — is not acceptable,” she said.

Calls for gun control?

Some Democrats, including Raskin, used the hearing to highlight gun violence and pushed for a ban on AR-15s.

He noted another mass shooting the same day as the attempt on Trump’s life killed four and injured at least 10 others at a Birmingham, Alabama, nightclub.

“This means, amazingly, that the Butler attack was not even the deadliest mass shooting to happen in America on that day,” he said. “We have to find the courage and resolve to pass a ban on the AR-15 and other assault weapons.”

Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan pointed out that this year, the committee had?not held a hearing on the “over 260 mass shootings that we’ve had, killing hundreds of people, injuring hundreds, changing their lives forever.”

More investigations

On Monday, members of the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee, led by Chairman Mark Green, a Republican from Tennessee, visited the site of the rally. The committee also plans to hold a hearing on the assassination attempt in Washington Tuesday.

Republican Rep. Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania, whose district includes Butler, was also in attendance.

A proposal, submitted by Kelly, to establish a task force on the attempted assassination is scheduled for a vote on the House floor this week.

It would “investigate and fully examine all actions by any agency, Department, officer, or employee of the federal government, as well as State and local law enforcement or any other State or local government or private entities or individuals” related to the attempted assassination.

The task force would also issue a final report on its findings no later than Dec. 13.

Separately, President Joe Biden asked the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to launch an “independent security review” of the attempted assassination, and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Sunday named a bipartisan panel to conduct a “45-day independent review” regarding the actions of the agency and state and local authorities before, during and in the aftermath of the July 13 rally.

Candles glimmer as friends and family engage in prayer during a vigil. (Photo by Hailey Roden, LINK nky)

“We have never dealt with this before,” was how Florence Police Chief Jeff Mallery described the mass shooting of seven people in the early hours of July 6.

“I know it’s gone on throughout the nation, but this is the first time that we’ve had a mass shooting in Florence,” Mallery said during a press conference that afternoon.?

Devastation ripped through the community as four victims, ranging in age from 19 to 44, died of injuries suffered at a 21st birthday party on Ridgecrest Drive. Twenty-year-old Shane Miller, 20-year-old Hayden Rybicki, 19-year-old Delaney Eary and 44-year-old Melissa Parrett were killed.

Three victims were recovering in the hospital at press time. Among them is 19-year-old Chloe Parrett.?

During a packed vigil for the victims at Crossroads Florence Church on July 9, Bruce Parrett, Chloe’s father and ex-husband of Melissa Parrett, said that Chloe’s mother is the reason she is alive.?

Chloe still faces a long road to recovery: Both of her lungs were affected by her injuries and are unable to hold air, according to her father. “She’s never going to be the same,” Parrett said.?

Attending the memorial was his first time leaving the hospital since Chloe was admitted. He said he was overwhelmed and surprised to see the outpouring of support.?

“The support is just phenomenal. I thought there would be a few people that knew us and knew the other families, but this is definitely the village coming together to help those in need,” he said.

While Parrett is grateful for the support, he said his outlook for the future is grim.?

“I mean, I’m not very hopeful for the future. I really am not after this has happened. I love the support, but it’s just so devastating. Now I’m worried about things like this happening again. If it happened to me, it could happen to anybody. And I hate to see that other families are going to have to go through situations like this.”?

He said guns are too easily accessible to people who shouldn’t have them. “I don’t know what the answer is, but I know what the answer is not,” said Parrett. “The answer is not sitting on our hands and doing nothing.”?

The party was being held for Parrett’s son at the time of the shooting, Mallery said.

Mallery said other partygoers told officers the shooter fled in a vehicle. Officers were able to track down the suspect and attempted to stop him near Farmview Drive and U.S. 42, but the suspect fled again. A chase ensued. Finally, the suspect drove off the road into a ditch on Dale Heimbrock Way near Hicks Pike. The officers found the suspect with what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was transported to St. Elizabeth Hospital, where he died.?

The suspect has since been identified as 21-year-old Chase Garvey. Court documents indicate Garvey was on probation for a felony charge of unlawfully transacting with a minor in 2021, a charge he received after pleading down from two other felony charges after sexually assaulting a 13 year old girl in his car.?

He was committed to house arrest before accepting the lower charge instead of facing trial. He was then sentenced to five years in prison, but the sentence was probated on the condition that he not interact with the victim, not commit any more crimes, engage in psychological counseling and maintain employment. He was scheduled to come off of probation in 2027.

Mallery said Garvey’s motive is still under investigation and that he didn’t believe the shooting was connected to Garvey’s past crimes. It is illegal for felony offenders to own a gun, and how Garvey obtained one is still unclear.?

Remembering the victims?

Rybicki’s mother, Cherri McGuire, wrote a letter to her son in his obituary. “You were an unexpected gift from God. You were smart, witty, kind, so handsome and the most loving human being I have ever met. You made me become a stronger and better person. You are my angel. I hope you know how much I love you; I cannot even put it into words.”

Connor Velpreda remembers his best friend, Rybicki, as “a good soul.” He said that “the way he carried himself impacted so many hearts.”

“Through everything he’s endured in this life, the common denominator was always that contagious grin that never seemed to fade,” Velpreda said. “He is someone I am proud to call my best friend, and he was a best friend to more than just [me].”

Shane Miller’s aunt, Sheryl Beatty, sent LINK nky’s media partner WCPO a statement about her nephew, whom she said aspired to be a police officer.

“Shane was a young man that any parent would be proud to call their own. He was always smiling with a kind word for everyone. He was a fun person to be around; he woke every day happy with a positive outlook. He was a charismatic person when people met him they would want to continue to be a friend of his. He enjoyed his friends, but his best friend was his cousin Sergio. Family was everything to him,” Beatty said.?

“Shane was a young, beautiful, amazing man with an old soul. His joy was doing anything outdoors from fishing to kayaking. Shane bought two kayaks, one for him and one for Sergio. He was a bright light to this world and will always be one to his family. There are no words for the pain of his loss or how much he will be missed.”

On July 8, Paige Johnson, a friend of Eary’s, stopped by the memorial set outside the home where the shooting happened.

“Everybody that knew Delaney like seriously loved her so much,” Johnson told WCPO. “Like she was such a joy. Such a light in everybody’s lives.”

Johnson attended Cooper High School with Eary, who was a few years younger. The two shared a love of singing and dancing, she said.

“We had a few friends who would pick us up, and we would all just go to this club that we have for Cooper’s Navigators Ministry, and we all had sunglasses on and I’m sitting on Delaney’s lap, and we’re just like singing and we’re dancing,” Robinson said. “It was awesome. Delaney was just that type of person who would just sit there – dance, laugh, anything like that.”

Leah Moore, who was at the birthday party but left before the shooting, said she’s going to miss Melissa Parrett, who was hosting her son’s birthday party.

“What I’m going to miss most about Missy, especially Missy, is her spirit, her personality,” Moore said. “A lot of people will tell you that people close to them are one of the best people you’ve ever met. Truly, Missy was that.”

A community rallies

Shortly after the tragedy, the community jumped into action to support those reeling from the loss.?

Boone County Public Schools offered free emotional and psychological counseling July 8 to local students and families.?

“This weekend’s tragedy hit home to the Boone County community,” read an announcement from the district. “Some of the victims were connected in some way to the Boone County School District. We would like it to be known that counseling services will be available for any students or families who may need support.”

The next day Crossroads Church in Florence held a community night of prayer, at which Florence Mayor Julie Metzger Aubuchon addressed the community in an emotional speech.

“I had the opportunity of visiting Chloe, Claire, Connor [the three surviving victims] yesterday in the hospital,” Aubuchon said. “They are fighting. Tonight, as we gather at Crossroads Florence, we can connect, support one another, and begin that healing process.”

On July 10, Florence offered professional mental health and pet therapy services at the Florence Government Center.?

LINK nky Kenton County reporter Nathan Granger, LINK nky contributor Hayley Jarman, and WCPO’s Molly Schramm, Valerie Lyons, Krizia Williams and Michael Coker contributed to this story.

This story is republished from LINK nky.

President Joe Biden delivers remarks at the White House on Sunday, July 14, 2024 on the assassination attempt on Republican presidential candidate, former President Donald Trump. A shooter opened fire injuring Trump, killing one audience member, and injuring two others during a campaign event in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13. Biden was joined by Vice President Kamala Harris and Attorney General Merrick Garland. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden Sunday called for unity and pledged an independent review following the campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Saturday where former President Donald J. Trump was shot and injured.

“An assassination attempt is contrary to everything we stand for as a nation,” Biden said in remarks from the White House Sunday afternoon, adding that “there is no place in America for this kind of violence or any violence for that matter.”

Biden said the independent review will “assess exactly what happened and we’ll share the results of that independent review with the American people as well.”

“Unity is the most elusive goal of all, but nothing is (more) important than that right now,” Biden said. “We’ll debate and we’ll disagree, that’s not going to change. But we’re not gonna lose sight of the fact (of) who we are as Americans.”

Biden added that he is directing the U.S. Secret Service to assess the security measures for the Republican National Convention beginning Monday in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where the GOP will formally nominate Trump for president.

Trump wrote on Truth Social that he was initially planning to delay his trip to the RNC by two days, but said he could not “allow a ‘shooter,’ or potential assassin, to force change to scheduling, or anything else” and so would arrive later Sunday.

Outraged congressional Republicans on Sunday demanded answers from the Secret Service as to how the shooter was able to access a rooftop within range of the former president, and committee leaders began planning hearings and probes. The FBI is investigating the shooting as an attempted assassination.

South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” he was grateful the former president “survived an assassination attempt,” and noted how dangerous the situation was.

“How could this happen?” Graham asked. “How could somebody get within 130 yards of the president with a rifle?”

On Sunday night, in an address from the Oval Office, Biden repeated his plea for unity and called for Americans to cool down their political rhetoric.

“Remember, we may disagree. We are not enemies. We’re neighbors. We’re friends, coworkers, citizens. And most importantly, we’re our fellow Americans. We must stand together,” he said.

Biden stressed that political participation needed to remain peaceful.

“In America, we resolve our differences at the ballot box,” he said. “Not with bullets.”

Pennsylvanian killed

Several loud pops rang out as Trump was beginning a campaign event Saturday that quickly ended with him cupping blood on the side of his face and defiantly pumping his fist at the crowd and shouting “Fight, fight, fight,” before he was whisked off-stage by Secret Service agents.

Trump was injured but pronounced safe by the Secret Service and he later wrote on his social media site Truth Social that he was shot “with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear.”

An attendee at the rally was killed, and two others were injured in the shooting.

Pennsylvania Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro on Sunday identified the person killed as Corey Comperatore. Local news reports said he was a former fire chief.

“Corey died a hero,” Shapiro said during a news conference. “Corey dove on his family to protect them last night.”

Shortly after the shooting, Secret Service spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi said in a statement the shooter “fired multiple shots toward the stage from an elevated position outside of the rally venue,” and Secret Service personnel shot and killed the individual.

The FBI identified the shooter as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania.

Congressional Republicans said they want answers from the Secret Service about how the event unfolded and if there were any security shortcomings.

The Secret Service is responsible for the safety of current and former presidents, and certain government officials.

Guglielmi on Sunday morning on X addressed “an untrue assertion that a member of the former President’s team requested additional security resources & that those were rebuffed.”

He said that was “absolutely false.”

“In fact, we added protective resources & technology & capabilities as part of the increased campaign travel tempo,” he said.

The agency falls under the Department of Homeland Security, and congressional Republicans have clashed with DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, to the point of impeachment. The Senate, controlled by Democrats, dismissed the two articles of impeachment.???

House GOP inquiry

Hours after the Saturday night shooting, House Speaker Mike Johnson wrote on X that the House will conduct an investigation of the incident.

On the “Today” show Sunday, Johnson said that the House’s probe will “determine where there were lapses in security and anything else that the American people need to know and deserve to know.”

Republican Rep. Mark Green of Tennessee, who chairs the House Homeland Security Committee, wrote a letter to Mayorkas saying he was concerned how the shooter was able to “access a rooftop within range and direct line of sight of where President Trump was speaking.”

“The seriousness of this security failure and chilling moment in our nation’s history cannot be understated,” Green wrote in the letter. “Had the bullet’s trajectory been slightly different, the assassination attempt on President Trump might have succeeded.”

Green asked Mayorkas to provide the committee with several documents by July 22, such as the security plan for the rally, Secret Service protocol for assassination attempts and copies of briefing materials given to Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris about the incident.

Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri sent a letter to Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chair Gary Peters of Michigan to push for an investigation into the shooting.

Hawley, who sits on the committee, said the investigation “must include public testimony, hearings, and robust oversight over the relevant federal departments as they respond to this assassination attempt.”

Montana Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, who also sits on the committee, made the same request, and argued the need for an investigation because “individuals and groups will use yesterday’s tragedy to sow division in our country,” and that the committee “can help push back on those efforts by investigating and publicizing the facts surrounding yesterday.”

An aide to Peters, speaking on background, said the “committee will be conducting an investigation,” and that the committee has requested a briefing for members as soon as possible.

Peters, a Democrat, is “speaking with Secretary Mayorkas today, and committee staff are receiving a briefing from the department this afternoon,” the aide said.

“As we learn more about what happened, the investigation will likely include additional steps including hearings,” the aide said.

Comer wants Secret Service director to testify

Chair of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee GOP Rep. James Comer of Kentucky said in a statement that he will send a formal invitation for Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle to appear for a hearing.

“There are many questions and Americans demand answers,” Comer said.

Biden, who spoke Saturday night briefly after the shooting, denounced political violence and declined to say if the incident was an assassination attempt.

“I have an opinion, but I don’t have any facts,” Biden said, speaking from the Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, police department, near his vacation home. “So I want to make sure we have all the facts before I make some comment.”

‘Cool things down’

Lawmakers on both sides of the political aisle immediately condemned the political violence.?

On Sunday, they took to various talk shows and urged for a cooling down of political rhetoric.? “We’ve got to turn the temperature down in this country,” Johnson said.

Rep. Dan Meuser of Pennsylvania, who was at the rally Saturday, made similar remarks on “Meet the Press,” where he said “we all need to take responsibility and cool things down.”

Melania Trump, the president’s wife, on Sunday called for Americans to “reunite.”

“Dawn is here again,” she said in a statement. “This morning, ascend above the hate, the vitriol, and the simple-minded ideas that ignite violence. We all want a world where respect is paramount, family is first, and love transcends.”

Shootings, threats, attacks

Threats against lawmakers and political violence have increased over the years.

Then-Rep. Gabby Giffords of Arizona, a Democrat, was shot at a constituent event in 2011. Her husband, Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona, on X condemned the violence: “No one should ever have to experience political violence — we know that firsthand.”

And House Republican Majority Leader Steve Scalise of Louisiana was shot and injured in 2017 during a congressional baseball practice.

Of the 7,501 threats made to members of Congress during 2022, only 22 led to prosecution, the U.S. Capitol Police confirmed to States Newsroom.

Two years ago, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, was attacked and injured in their home in California and a kidnapping and assassination attempt was thwarted in 2020 against Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.

And in the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection on the U.S. Capitol, a mob of pro-Trump supporters breached the building in an attempt to stop Congress from certifying the electoral results.

No motive cited yet

The motivation behind the attack is still under investigation. According to The Associated Press, there were bomb-making materials found in Crooks’ home.

Crooks is a registered Republican, according to Pennsylvania voting records, and he made a $15 donation to Progressive Turnout Project PAC in 2021, according to Federal Election Commission records.?

The shooting came two days before thousands of Republicans gather for the Republican National Convention, where they will formally nominate Trump on Thursday. Trump also will announce his running mate at some point.

Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican convention host committee in Milwaukee, said on ABC News that he spoke with Trump after the shooting and that the former president wants the convention to move forward.

“It’s not going to be scaled back,” Priebus said. “In fact, if you had to ask me, I would say this convention is going to be epic.”

Senior advisers to the Trump campaign, Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita, said in a joint statement after the shooting that Trump wasn’t changing his plans for the RNC.

“President Trump looks forward to joining you all in Milwaukee as we proceed with our convention to nominate him to serve as the 47th President of the United States,” they said. “As our party’s nominee, President Trump will continue to share his vision to Make America Great Again.”

Law enforcement agents stand near the stage of a campaign rally for Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump on July 13, 2024 in Butler, Pennsylvania. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

The FBI said early Sunday it had identified the man who shot former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally on Saturday as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania.

The U.S. Secret Service said Saturday night that the shooter “fired multiple shots toward the stage from an elevated position outside of the rally venue,” adding Secret Service personnel “neutralized the shooter, who is now deceased.”

Trump was pronounced safe shortly after the incident. A spectator at the rally were killed and two others were injured in the shooting. The victims’ identities have not yet been released by law enforcement.

“Tonight we had what we’re calling an assassination attempt on our former president, Donald Trump,” Special Agent in Charge Kevin Rojek of the FBI Pittsburgh field office said at a press conference late Saturday. “We do not currently have an identified motive.”

Gov. Josh Shapiro on Sunday identified the person who was killed as Corey Comperatore, who local news reports identified as a former fire chief for Buffalo Township. He said flags will be flown at half-staff at Commonwealth facilities, public buildings, and grounds across the state.

“Corey was a girl dad. Corey was a firefighter. Corey went to church every Sunday. Corey loved his community most especially, Corey loved his family,” Shapiro said during a press conference. “Corey was an avid supporter of the former president, was so excited to be there last night with him in the community. I asked Corey’s wife if it would be OK for me to share that we spoke. She said yes. She also asked that I share with all of you that Corey died a hero. That Corey dove on his family to protect them last night at this rally. Corey was the very best of us. May his memory be a blessing.”

Pennsylvania State Police identified the other two victims as David Dutch, 57, of New Kensington, and James Copenhaver, 74, of Moon Township. Both were listed in stable condition Sunday afternoon, PSP said.

“These victims and their families are certainly in our thoughts today,” state police Col. Christopher Paris said Sunday. “The Pennsylvania State Police continue to work tirelessly alongside our federal, state and local partners as this investigation continues.”

State voter records show Crooks was a registered Republican, and a Federal Election Commission filing showed he made a $15 donation on Jan, 20, 2021 to the “Progressive Turnout Project,” before he would have been old enough to vote. He was a 2022 graduate of Bethel Park High School, the school district confirmed in a statement.

The U.S. Secret Service said Saturday night that the shooter “fired multiple shots toward the stage from an elevated position outside of the rally venue.”

Trump thanked well-wishers in a post to Truth Social Sunday morning. “Thank you to everyone for your thoughts and prayers yesterday, as it was God alone who prevented the unthinkable from happening. We will FEAR NOT, but instead remain resilient in our Faith and Defiant in the face of Wickedness,” he wrote.

“Our love goes out to the other victims and their families,” he continued. “We pray for the recovery of those who were wounded, and hold in our hearts the memory of the citizen who was so horribly killed. In this moment, it is more important than ever that we stand United, and show our True Character as Americans, remaining Strong and Determined, and not allowing Evil to Win. I truly love our Country, and love you all, and look forward to speaking to our Great Nation this week from Wisconsin.”

The site of the shooting at the Butler Farm Show Inc. about 40 minutes north of Pittsburgh, remained an active crime scene, although authorities said they did not believe there was any ongoing threat.

Anyone who attended the rally or has information is asked to call 1-800-call-fbi, or go to fbi.gov/butler.

The shooting began shortly after Trump took the stage at about 6 p.m. Saturday. Several loud pops could be heard and a bloodied Trump was whisked from the stage, but not before pumping his fist toward the crowd.

Trump confirmed he was shot in a post to Truth Social a few hours after the shooting.” I was shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear,” he wrote.

How the shooter was able to get so close to the former president was not clear. Rojek said it was “surprising,” and added “the Secret Service really needs to answer that question, they conduct the initial site survey, they do the initial security assessments and determine where the different security locations should be, and they’re the ones who are in charge of securing the scene.”

President Joe Biden condemned the shooting in a brief statement from Delaware Saturday night “There’s no place in America for this kind of violence,” Biden said.

Congressional Republicans, meanwhile, have initiated an investigation into the incident. U.S. Rep. James Comer, R-Kentucky, chairman of the House Oversight Committee, sent an email to Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle requesting her to appear at a committee hearing July 22.

The Trump campaign said Saturday the former president, who was out of the hospital and at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, would attend the Republican National Committee in Milwaukee this week as planned. He will receive the GOP’s formal nomination as its 2023 presidential candidate on Thursday.

This story is republished from the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a sister publication to the Kentucky Lantern and part of the nonprofit States Newsroom network.

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump is rushed offstage during a rally on July 13, 2024 in Butler, Pennsylvania. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

BUTLER, PA — Shortly after former President Donald Trump took the stage at a rally at 6 p.m., several loud pops could be heard, and Trump, obviously bleeding, was whisked off the stage. Multiple reports suggested the noises were gunshots, and video from the incident appeared to show Trump reacting to something hitting his ear. The event was to be his final campaign rally before he formally accepts the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nomination at next week’s Republican National Convention.

A U.S. Secret Service spokesman, posting on X, said the “Secret Service has implemented protective measures and the former President is safe. This is now an active Secret Service investigation and further information will be released when available.”

LIVE: Sounds of multiple shots heard at Trump rally in Pennsylvania https://t.co/0htWSbaRrZ

— Reuters (@Reuters) July 13, 2024

This is a breaking story that will be updated.

Speakers at the event ahead of Trump included representatives from the oil and gas industries, the mayor of Slippery Rock, and Sean Parnell, a former GOP candidate for U.S. Senate who received Trump’s endorsement, but suspended his campaign in 2021 after his then-wife testified he had abused her and their children.

U.S. Rep. Dan Meuser (R-9th District), who took the stage to AC-DC’s “Thunderstruck” told the audience Trump “will deliver on his promises. Our border will be secure. He will end the gas backwards energy policy of the Biden administration and in Pennsylvania, natural gas will flow again. We will make manufacturing great again by being the most competitive place in the world to build things.”

U.S. Rep. Mike Kelly (R-16th District), whose district includes Butler, pointed to Biden’s debate performance as evidence that “the media has been lying to us” about the president’s health.

“Have you ever heard the term ‘playing through the whistle?’ Playing it through the whistle means you keep on playing, you keep on doing what you have to do to win,” Kelly said. “You keep on going to make sure you don’t lose. But I want to give you a different version: We’d better play it through the echo of the whistle. Playing through the whistle isn’t enough, not with this crew that we’re fighting against right now.”

GOP U.S. Senate candidate David McCormick, who is challenging three-term incumbent Bob Casey, reiterated his claims that Casey votes with Biden 98% of the time.? “I like to say Punxsutawney, because it reminds me of Punxsutawney, Bob, Bob Casey, that is who only comes out of his hole once every six years,” McCormick said.

“The lack of leadership, lack of moral clarity, an economy where 60% of Pennsylvanians are living paycheck to paycheck, and prices are up by more than 20% and is the result of the terrible, flawed policies of Joe Biden, the spending Bob Casey supported it every step of the way,” he added.

McCormick repeated another familiar highlight of his campaign stump speech, pointing to the fentanyl crisis. “For those of you who are Vietnam vets, we lost 53,000 veterans in eight years of war. We had two Vietnams last year in the United States from fentanyl,” he said. “This is a war against us.”

McCormick also referenced Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, who was detained in Russia in 2023, and Oakmont resident Marc Fogel, a teacher detained in Russia in 2021. Fogel’s mother said earlier in the week she was going to seek Trump’s help in securing her son’s release.

“We need leadership that’s going to stand up and bring Pennsylvanian Mark Fogel home to Pennsylvania, home to America. That’s what leaders do. That’s what a commander in chief does,” McCormick said.

The Democratic National Committee rolled out a billboard in Butler to greet Trump on Saturday that jabs at the former president’s economic record. The billboard, with the words “Donald Trump was a disaster for Pennsylvania,” will be located at the end of the Pullman Viaduct, about 10 minutes away from the Butler Farm Show.

“Pennsylvania voters remember Trump’s failures and know exactly how much is at stake in November,” DNC spokesperson Addy Toevs said in a statement. “That’s why they’ll reject Trump and his Project 2025 agenda, and once again send President Biden to the White House.”

As Trump rallied in western Pennsylvania on Saturday, first lady Jill Biden was also in the region to attend an Italian Sons and Daughters of America dinner in Pittsburgh.

And in the eastern half of the commonwealth, Vice President Kamala Harris was in Philadelphia to deliver the keynote address at the Asian Pacific Islander American Vote Presidential Town Hall on Saturday.

Saturday’s appearance in the Keystone State is Trump’s fifth visit to Pennsylvania this year, but his first in the western half of the commonwealth. Trump has made two 2024 appearances in Philadelphia, once for a rally on Temple University’s campus, and to deliver brief remarks at Sneaker Con in February. He also held a rally in the Lehigh Valley in April, and delivered a keynote address to a National Rifle Association gathering in Harrisburg in February.

“Donald Trump can take his twice-impeached, 34-time convicted, vowed-to-be-dictator-on-day-one, consumed by revenge, serial liar, Project 2025 self out of Pennsylvania and go back to his Mar-a-Lago golf course,” Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. Austin Davis said in a statement Saturday. “After he destroyed our economy, screwed over workers, and called for the ‘termination’ of the Constitution written in our state, Pennsylvania voters will send him packing in November. Again.”

Butler is a reliably red county where Trump won by double digits in the 2016 and 2020 general elections. Trump’s rally in Butler a few days before the 2020 presidential election was well-attended, although there were transportation issues for those attempting to exit the rally.

President Joe Biden has also been no stranger to Pennsylvania, making ten appearances the state so far, mostly in the southeast. Biden campaigned through the state last Sunday, appearing at a traditionally Black church in Northwest Philadelphia, and speaking to supporters in Philadelphia and Harrisburg.

Biden returns to battleground Pennsylvania for campaign events in Philadelphia and Harrisburg

As of Saturday morning, 18 Democrats serving in the U.S. House and one serving in the U.S. Senate have called on Biden to not seek the Democratic Party nomination, following his poor debate performance in late June, amid questions about whether he can beat Trump in November.

Biden has repeatedly said he does not plan to drop out of the race, reiterating his position at a rally in Michigan on Friday, where he was greeted with chants of “don’t you quit” and “we got your back,” from a crowd at Renaissance High School in Detroit.

“You made me the nominee, no one else — not the press, not the pundits, not the insiders, not donors,” Biden told the audience. “You, the voters. You decided. No one else. And I’m not going anywhere.”

Support for the president

Pennsylvania Democrats have largely remained behind the Scranton native. Gov. Josh Shapiro, who has been mentioned as a potential candidate for president or vice president should Biden step aside, has remained committed to Biden’s 2024 bid. U.S. Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) has also emerged as a key campaign surrogate for Biden.

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.), who is seeking a fourth term in office, has also stood by Biden’s side, while other Democrats in battleground states have distanced themselves from him. On Friday, speaking to reporters after an event in Darlington Township, Beaver County, Casey reiterated his support for Biden, saying it had not changed.

“I think we’re going to have a unified party between now and November,” Casey said. “This is a difficult period, but we’ll get there. But you know where I stand.”

McCormick has blasted the three-term senator for continuing to support Biden. His campaign put up billboards in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Scranton this week reading “Same old tired ideas,” with photos of the two Democrats.

In response to a question about whether he was worried about Biden being a potential drag on his Senate race and other down ballot races on Friday, Casey answered with a firm “no.”

Pennsylvania U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio (D-17th District) who also spoke at the event in Darlington with Casey, urged people to “Google Project 2025, and what Donald Trump expects to do if he becomes president, again. It is dangerous,” he said. “It is threatening to our freedom and the fundamentals of our rule of law in this country. “

Deluzio added that he thinks Democrats will unite to “make sure Trump is never the president of this country again.”

However, U.S. Rep. Susan Wild (D-7th District) has expressed concern about Biden’s “electability” and U.S. Rep. Summer Lee (D-12th District) has said Biden needs to show “that he’s up for the task” of staying in the race.

Lee, who was scheduled to attend a Pittsburgh rally for Biden with Allegheny County Democrats on Friday but did not appear due to a schedule conflict, did not answer questions about Biden at an event in Pittsburgh with U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra. Lee said she would not answer a political question while at an event where she was appearing in her capacity as a member of Congress, TribLive reported.

Pennsylvania GOP unites behind Trump

Trump, who was convicted of 34 felony counts in a New York courtroom in May, largely has united the Pennsylvania Republican Party behind his candidacy. With the exception of U.S. Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-1st District), every GOP member of the state’s congressional delegation has endorsed Trump;? Fitzpatrick has not announced who he will be voting for in November. The only Republican in Pennsylvania’s congressional delegation to represent a district Biden won in 2020, Fitzpatrick said he wrote in Mike Pence for president in 2016, but voted for Trump in 2020.

Pennsylvania’s 19 electoral votes are critical to the candidates’ chances of winning in November. Biden campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon sent a memo to supporters listing Pennsylvania as one of the three “blue wall” states that provide the campaign the “clearest pathway” to reelection.

Recent polling indicates that Biden and Trump are engaged in a close race for Pennsylvania, although Trump holds a narrow edge. The Cook Political Report ranks Pennsylvania in the toss-up category. It has the largest number of electoral votes of any battleground state.

This story is republished from the Pennsylvania Capital-Star, a sister publication to the Kentucky Lantern and part of the nonprofit States Newsroom network.

Florence Police officers were dispatched to a house on Ridgecrest Drive at around 2:50 a.m. Saturday but the suspect had driven away by the time they arrived. (Florence Police Department)

Five people — four victims and the suspect — have died following a shooting that occurred in Florence early in the morning on Saturday, July 6. Three more people are in the hospital but are in stable condition, according to Florence Police, who are characterizing the incident as a mass shooting.?

Police officers were dispatched to a house on Ridgecrest Drive at around 2:50 a.m. Saturday. By the time the police arrived, the suspect had already driven away from the scene, a written police statement reads. Four victims were pronounced dead at the scene and three more were transported to UC Hospital, where they are currently in stable condition and expected to make a full recovery.

Florence Police Chief Jeff Mallery identified the four victims at a press conference Saturday afternoon: 20-year-old Shane Miller, 20-year-old Hayden Rybicki, 19-year-old Delaney Eary and 44-year-old Melissa Parrett. One of the victims was the home owner.?

“Our hearts and prayers go out to the families of the victims,” Mallery said at the press conference, visibly emotional.

LINK nky’s content sharing partner WCPO had crews on the scene and interviewed a neighbor, who said at around 2:15 a.m. after he left a party, he heard what he first thought were fireworks. At the press conference, Mallery added that police officers had heard gun shots upon their arrival at the house.

A 21st birthday party was being held for Parrett’s son at the time of the shooting, Mallery said.

Mallery said other partygoers told officers the shooter fled in a vehicle. Officers were able to track down the suspect and attempted to stop him near Farmview Drive and US-42, but the suspect fled again. A chase ensued. Finally, the suspect drove off the road into a ditch on Dale Heimbrock Way near Hicks Pike. The officers located the suspect with what appeared to be a self-inflicted gun shot wound. He was transported to St. Elizabeth Hospital, where he died. Authorities don’t believe Garvey was invited to the party, but he was known by other partygoers, Mallery said.

The suspect has since been identified as 21-year-old Chase Garvey, who was a convicted felon from a previous sex offense, but Mallery said they don’t believe that is connected to the shooting. Records from the courts and the Department of Corrections indicate that Garvey was on probation for a felony charge of unlawfully transacting with a minor in 2021. He was sentenced to five years in prison, but the sentence was suspended in favor of probation on the condition he didn’t interact with the victim, didn’t commit any more crimes, engage in psychological counseling and maintain employment. He was scheduled to come off of probation in 2027.?

Mallery said Garvey’s motive is still under investigation.

“We have never dealt with this before,” Mallery said. “I know it’s gone on throughout the nation, but this is the first time that we’ve had a mass shooting in Florence.”

The Florence Police Department is asking anyone who has any information related to this event to call them at (859)371-1234.

This is a developing story and LINK nky will report more on it as information becomes available.?

WCPO’s Sean DeLancey, Molly Schramm, Krizia Williams & Michael Coker contributed reporting to this story.

This story is republished from LINK nky.

Jaquan Porter, 25, says that at a time when he "worried about surviving more than being a kid" Kentucky's juvenile justice system brought structure to his life. He also says the system failed him on multiple levels and that he was later diagnosed with anxiety and other mental health conditions. Porter says having a mentor when he was a teenager would have helped him. (Photo provided)

A state law taking effect next month will require more kids charged with violent offenses to be held in Kentucky’s troubled juvenile jails — at a time when all eight of the youth detention centers are under federal investigation for possible abuses.

That worries Devine Carama, who directs the One Lexington program to tackle gun violence in Fayette County.??

“In no other system would you allow that,” said Carama. “If there’s an investigation that’s this deep and wide, and it’s coming from a federal perspective, I don’t think the time is (right) to implement policy that puts more young people into the system.”

Cortney Downs, chief equity officer for Kentucky Youth Advocates, agrees that it doesn’t make sense to place more children in a system that’s troubled enough for the federal government to be investigating it.?

The U.S. Department of Justice announced last month that it is investigating Kentucky’s Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) for possible excessive use of force, prolonged and punitive isolation, inadequate protection from violence and sexual abuse, as well as whether mental health and educational services are available to juveniles in eight detention centers and one youth development center.

The federal investigation follows reports in recent years of understaffing and? violence, including a riot in the Adair Youth Detention Center during which a girl in state custody was allegedly sexually assaulted and a report that employees were attacked at a youth detention center in Warren County. State Auditor Allison Ball in January issued a report that raised multiple concerns including the use of isolation, tasers and chemical agents against juveniles.

Black youth are overrepresented in Kentucky’s juvenile justice system, the Lantern has reported. ?

Downs also worries about another new state law that will allow more minors to be tried as adults and that could increase the number of juveniles in detention.?

“These facilities are still understaffed,” she said. “And so if you’re bringing in more kids, but you don’t have more staff to supervise these kids, manage these kids, we could potentially just continue seeing more of the same issues that we have been seeing.”?

The mandatory 48-hour hold for some accused juveniles was approved by the legislature and signed by Gov. Andy Beshear in 2023 as part of broader juvenile justice legislation. Sen. Danny Carroll, R-Benton, tried to delay its implementation this year in a bill that did not pass. ?

As a result, the state must soon detain juveniles who, under the previous law, could have been deemed eligible for release to their families while awaiting a detention hearing.

Morgan Hall, a spokesperson for the Justice & Public Safety Cabinet, said the federal investigation “does not alter current state law.”?

The system has increased employees from 315 to 458 in the last year in preparation for the juvenile population bump, though Hall said “it is difficult to anticipate the potential impact in population numbers” right now.?

The department is also “actively recruiting” licensed clinical social workers to provide required mental health assessments for those coming into the system charged with violent crimes, Hall said.?

“The Beshear administration remains focused on creating safe and secure facilities while making the investments needed to support our at-risk youth in mental health treatment, alternatives to detention, second chance opportunities, education, and employee training,” Hall said.??

‘Apples and oranges’?

Through One Lexington, Carama works with youth who are considered high risk for entering a cycle of violence. Risk factors, identified by school officials, include poverty, food insecurity or having come from a background of violence or a fatherless home. Those children are then partnered with a peer mentor who can give them a sense of community and fill gaps in their lives.

Homicides and nonfatal shootings dropped significantly in Lexington in 2023, the Herald-Leader reported. The decline in violent crime was widespread across the country; still, Lexington officials attribute at least part of the drop in shootings to One Lexington’s work.?

Having a mentor like One Lexington offers would have helped Louisville’s Jaquan Porter who was 14, he says, when he was arrested and incarcerated for robbery. He feels his childhood lacked guidance.?

Porter stayed in the Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) system until he was 17. In his alternative program, staff dropped him off at school in a van and picked him up at the end of the day. Now 25, he just got his driver’s license and high school diploma, and plans to start college this fall.?

He’s well on his way to building the life he wants, but he feels like formative teenage years were robbed from him by a system he says failed him on multiple levels.?

Porter isn’t proud of his actions as a young teenager, but, at the time, he said, he didn’t see a way around it.?

The Louisville boy needed food and clothes. So, he stole.?

“I had to worry about survival,” he said. “When I was 14, I was worried about surviving more than being a kid.”?

“I was teaching myself while learning,” he said. While DJJ provided his life with some structure, he said, he left feeling alone again and not equipped to handle the real world.?

Carama says Kentucky should develop juvenile justice policy from a trauma-informed perspective.

“When I go to Frankfort, I hear a lot of lawmakers talk about their upbringing,” he said. “I hear a lot of people reference gun culture in rural areas and use that to compare some of these kids who are growing up in urban areas and I think those are two mistakes. Because, one, it’s apples and oranges.”?

Gun culture in the country and city are “totally different,” Carama said.?

In rural areas, “they’re passing down pistols as family heirlooms. There is wildlife in their immediate surroundings to where hunting is a sport, a family tradition,” Carama said. “They’re not passing down pistols as family heirlooms (in the) East End in Lexington. It’s trauma that’s being passed down. There is no hunting that’s happening in the west end of Louisville.”?

The rate of firearm deaths among Kentucky youth and adolescents was already higher than the national rate when it increased 42% during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to data compiled by the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation.

Before the pandemic, 2017-2019, there were 3.3 firearm deaths per 100,000 Kentucky kids. From 2020-2022, that increased to 4.7.?

Nationally, the rate increased from 2.4 per 100,000 kids in 2019 to 3.5 in 2022.?

Stigma feeds the cycle?

One Lexington is starting to see more second-generation youth who get involved in gun violence, Carama said. Sometimes that looks like a 5-year-old whose parent was shot growing into a teenager who turns to crime.?

“I think it’s the way trauma works,” Carama said. Some people who experience a trauma try to avoid a similar fate at all costs. Others lean into what they know, he said. “A lot of times, you become the very thing that has destroyed you and your family.”?

One way to break the cycle, Carama said, is to destigmatize mental health issues.?

“There is a physical and mental health lack of access” in some communities, he said. And: “There’s a stigma in brown and Black communities when it comes to mental health.”?

Prevention and early intervention are critical, Downs with KYA said. “The research has consistently said that the younger a child is when they get locked up or get involved with the justice system, the more likely they are to recidivate later in life,” Downs explained.?

Negative impacts of incarceration include missing out on educational or career opportunities, she said.?

Making sure people don’t view mental health with a stigmatized lens and making sure they have resources to work on their minds are key to breaking cycles of violence, Carama said.?

Porter says he was diagnosed with several mental health issues, including anxiety, after his incarceration.?

While in the system, “I didn’t have (anyone) to call on,” he said. “It built up so much trauma to my life.”?

Even now, it’s difficult for him to look at the justice system positively, he said. “How can I depend on someone when they already let me down?”?

‘Significant negative impacts’?

It’s “going to take a while” to finish the Justice Department investigation and develop and implement an improvement plan, Downs said. Meanwhile, more juveniles will be entering a system that’s failing them with “significant negative impacts on kids, on their mental health.”

“I’m glad that . . . something is potentially going to be done and that there’s going to be some oversight,” Downs said. “But it’s also just disappointing that things have been able to deteriorate as much as they have to the point where this is even needed.”

Porter now works with REFORM Louisville, a group within KYA that works to improve options for young people and advocate for good juvenile policy. He works with several community organizations to offer youth mentorship he lacked.

“Anything’s possible,” he said. “I went from having literally nothing to having a whole lot.? I pushed myself. I self-motivated…I never stopped, I never gave up.”??

The campus of the University of Kentucky, where trustees are set to give final consideration to controversial internal governance changes on Friday. (Photo by Mark Cornelison | UK Photo)

The University of Kentucky on Thursday will conduct a “full-scale active aggressor crisis exercise” from 8 a.m. until the afternoon.?

“If you see large numbers of emergency response teams on campus, including police, fire and EMS, do not be alarmed,” says a UK release, “this is only a drill.”

The training provides an opportunity for first responders to run drills they cannot run while classes are in session at the Lexington campus, says the release. The UK Police Department will be working with personnel from UK HealthCare, UK Public Relations and the UK Emergency Operations Center to practice coordinating a response with internal and external stakeholders in the event of an active aggressor situation. Local and state law enforcement will participate as well.

This drill is taking place in partnership with Texas A&M Engineering Extension Service, which specializes in emergency management and preparedness training.

Sen. Max Wise, R-Campbellsville, is surrounded by media on Feb. 22 as he fields questions on Senate Bill 2, legislation creating the position of school "guardian." LRC Public Information)

Kentucky school districts will have the option of employing armed “guardians” to fill vacant law enforcement positions on campuses under a bill that became law Tuesday without Gov. Andy Beshear’s signature.?

Senate Bill 2 is a Republican-backed measure that built upon a bipartisan school safety law that was passed in 2019 after a shooting at Marshall County High School. Sponsored by Sen. Max Wise, of Campbellsville, this year’s legislation establishes the school “guardians” program while strengthening support for mental health resources.?

Beshear, a Democrat who recently won reelection in Kentucky, signed the 2019 law. He also signed a 2022 law requiring a school resource officer (SRO), a type of sworn law enforcement officer, on each campus in Kentucky.?

However, school districts have struggled to meet that requirement. Wise said while introducing his legislation this session that about 600 school campuses do not have SROs. School districts may begin using “guardians” during the 2025-26 school year. School districts may also choose to have “guardians” in schools as unpaid volunteers instead of employees.?

“When you let a bill lapse into law, it’s because you believe that there are certain good pieces on it, but you also have certain concerns,” Beshear told reporters Thursday in his weekly press conference.

The governor said he expected the Republican-controlled General Assembly to override a veto to SB 2 if he issued one, but he also wanted “to be in a position to make any program as safe as it can be knowing that it’s going to go into to law.”

Beshear added that he did have “worries about who might be in our schools” under the program and that the bill had “some real significant limitations” on trainings and tests for “guardians” to be certified. The program is voluntary for schools though, he continued.

“It’s like most of the world — this isn’t just a black or white issue,” Beshear said. “It’s a much tougher one.”

SB 2 had no additional funding tied to it when it was filed, but the legislature appropriated money for SROs in its budget bill — ?$16.5 million in the first fiscal year and then $18 million the following year. House Bill 6, ?the executive branch budget bill, says the Kentucky Department of Education would reimburse school districts up to $20,000 for each school that employs a full-time, on-site SRO.?

“We’ve learned so much about the power of additional adults with very specific training who can help keep our schools safe,” Wise said in a statement after the bill passed out of the Senate. “SB 2 complements our SROs with another set of eyes on campus or may help provide additional coverage on a school with multiple campuses.”??

Wise thanked the Kentucky Center for School Safety in a statement Wednesday afternoon for partnering on the bill.

“SB 2 bolsters the care we give to our young children and enhances the visibility of our schools through a comprehensive and connected mapping data system,” Wise said. “This provides a framework for interoperable communication inside and outside the school campus.”

The law says that certified guardians can be honorably discharged military veterans and retired or former law enforcement officers. The Kentucky Center for School Safety would certify such persons. They may carry a firearm on school property if the school district chooses.?

Florida has a school “guardian” program. Similar legislation passed in Utah this year.?

Additionally, the law directs trauma-informed teams in schools to assist school employees who work with students who have experienced trauma and record an annual report about its activities throughout the school year.?

The House Education Committee had approved an amendment backed by Rep. Josh Calloway, R-Irvington, to the bill that would have allowed pastoral counselors to serve on trauma-informed teams in schools but it is not in the final law. The amendment was not called for a floor vote in the House.?

Throughout the session, members of the Kentucky chapter of Moms Demand Action spoke against the bill. Volunteer Cathy Hobart told the House Education Committee that “armed guards in our schools will give many people the illusion of safety, but there is no evidence that they actually provide any safety.”?

According to a report from The Trace, there are “only a handful of documented cases in which an armed security guard or stationed police officer has stopped a school shooting.”?

In response to the bill becoming law, Kirby Van Lierop, a volunteer with the Kentucky chapter of Moms Demand Action, said in a statement to the Kentucky Lantern it was “yet another example of how the gun lobby’s ‘guns everywhere’ agenda has taken over the meaning of public safety in our state,” and called allowing more guns in school a “dangerous and misguided idea.”?

“We’re disappointed that our lawmakers spent this legislative session working overtime to pass this bill rather than actually passing preventative gun safety measures that would keep our children safe in school,” Van Lierop said. “But we won’t be deterred — we’ll continue to fight for common sense policies that will keep guns out of our schools and out of the hands of those who could be a danger to themselves and others. That’s what will really help keep our children safe.”?

Beshear also allowed another gun-related measure to become law without his signature. Senate Bill 20 requires that juveniles, 15 or older, accused of having a gun during the commission of an alleged felony be automatically transferred to circuit court for trial as an adult. The bill allows the commonwealth’s attorney to return the case to district court after determining that it would be in the best interest of “the public and the child to do so.”

This story was updated Thursday afternoon with additional comments.

Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman has called on Blair to resign. (Getty Images)

More Kentucky juveniles would be tried as adults under a bill that has now been approved by both chambers of the legislature.?

‘Victims before perpetrators:’ Senate passes bill to try certain juveniles as adults?

The House on Tuesday approved Senate Bill 20 which mandates that juveniles 15 or older would be transferred to circuit court for trial as an adult if they are alleged to have used a firearm while committing a Class A, B or C felony.?

Democratic Rep. Lindsey Burke of Lexington opposed the bill, saying it would rush kids in the “school to prison pipeline” to the “finish line.”

Burke and Rep. Keturah Herron noted that the bill reverses a change the legislature made just three years giving juvenile judges discretion to decide whether to transfer a gun case to adult court.

Rep. Patrick Flannery, R-Olive Hill, who introduced the measure in the House, said SB 20 is aimed at “very violent criminals.” It is sponsored by Sen. Matthew Deneen, R-Elizabethtown.

Rep. Josh Calloway, R-Russell, introduced the amendment adding pastoral counselors to the school "guardian" bill. (LRC Public Information)

FRANKFORT — A bill authorizing armed “guardians” to fill vacant law enforcement positions in Kentucky schools was passed by a House committee Tuesday morning with several new additions, including one allowing pastoral counselors in schools.?

Discussion among House Education Committee members largely centered on an amendment for Senate Bill 2 from Irvington Republican Rep. Josh Calloway that would allow licensed pastoral counselors to serve on trauma-informed teams in schools. He said the addition “gives parents options if they’re helping direct that care inside the school” and allows schools to have more “options based on what type of trauma that they were dealing with.”?

The original Senate Bill 2 directed trauma-informed teams in schools to assist school employees who work with students who have experienced trauma in the past and record an annual report about its activities throughout the school year.?

Republicans and Democrats on the committee raised concerns about the addition, but the amendment ultimately passed in a vote of 13-3 and one pass vote.?

Rep. Steve Riley, R-Glasgow, said his vote was a “wishy-washy yes” as he believes some ministers could excel in this capacity while others could not. He said he wanted to support the bill moving out of committee to avoid killing the entire legislation.?

“I’m concerned that this got dropped on us real fast without us having a chance to process everything about this and I need a little more time to process it,” Riley said.?

Another Republican, Rep. Killian Timoney, of Nicholasville, agreed with Riley. Timoney said that he does see that the addition could address needs in some districts but he did not believe it was necessary with his knowledge of the mental health system. He said in the committee that he has served on trauma-informed teams in the past.?

“If the alternative is to remove trauma-informed care, I’ll take this,” Timoney said.?

While voting no on the amendment, Louisville Democratic Rep. Tina Bojanowski, a teacher, said the committee had little preparation to consider the amendment that “some people would consider extreme” and added that not all of the questions were answered during the meeting.?

Another Louisville Democratic lawmaker, Rep. Josie Raymond, voted no because “school is school and church is church.”?

The primary sponsor of SB 2, Sen. Max Wise, R-Campbellsville, said he supported Calloway’s amendment as students who need mental health assistance could have “more offerings” under the change.?

Abby Piper, a lobbyist representing the Kentucky School Counselors Association, told the committee the organization was not consulted about the amendment and isn’t supportive of it. However, the association is supportive of SB 2 and the committee substitute adopted Tuesday.?

After the meeting, the association released a statement urging Kentuckians to tell their lawmakers to oppose Senate Bill 2.

According to the active license directory for the Kentucky Board of Licensure for Pastoral Counselors, the state has 33 active license holders.

Other changes

The committee also adopted a substitute version of the bill Tuesday. Chairman Rep. James Tipton, R-Taylorsville, said the changes included more oversight of the school “guardian” program by giving the Kentucky Center for School Safety a staffer to coordinate the program if funds are available. Tipton said funds were included in the Senate’s proposed budget.?

Under Wise’s original proposal, certified “guardians” would include honorably discharged military veterans and retired or former law enforcement officers. Other states like Florida have similar programs.?

Another change in the committee was that if a local school board does decide to employ a “guardian,” it must enter an agreement with local and state law enforcement to identify the chain of command in emergency situations.?

Wise had said his current legislation is a continuation of a school safety law that he successfully carried in 2019. The General Assembly enacted that as a response to a school shooting at Marshall County High School that killed two students and injured more than a dozen people.?

Representatives from the Kentucky chapter of Moms Demand Action spoke against the bill. The group seeks public safety measures to protect people from gun violence. One volunteer, Cathy Hobart, said she was “impressed with the care and concern” used to enact the 2019 law, but the current bill lacks the same concern behind it. He’s said his current legislation is a continuation of that policy.?

“I think that armed guards in our schools will give many people the illusion of safety, but there is no evidence that they actually provide any safety,” Hobart said. According to a report from The Trace, there are “only a handful of documented cases in which an armed security guard or stationed police officer has stopped a school shooting.”?

“And if we really want to keep our kids safe in school,” Hobart continued, “what we need to do is encourage their parents and grandparents and neighbors to lock up their guns.” Senate Bill 56, requiring safe storage of firearms and filed by Senate Democratic Floor Leader Gerald Neal, has not been given a committee hearing.?

As of Tuesday morning, Senate Bill 2 had no readings on the House floor. After a third reading, the House can vote on the legislation.?

Whitney Westerfield (LRC Public Information)

This story mentions suicide. If you or someone you know is contemplating suicide, please call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988.

A Republican-backed draft bill aimed at temporarily removing firearms from Kentuckians at risk of harming themselves or others garnered mixed reactions from the Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary Friday morning.?

Sen. Whitney Westerfield, R-Fruit Hill, will introduce t?he Crisis Aversion and Rights Retention Orders bill, or CARR, in the 2024 legislative session, which begins Jan. 2. He’s motivated by shootings that left children dead and people injured.?

“The law has to allow us to protect people,” Westerfield told his colleagues Friday.??

“I feel like it’s my obligation, and though I can’t speak for you, I believe it is your obligation, to not be afraid to have difficult conversations about the toughest issues that people of Kentucky face,” he said.?

The nonprofit Whitney Strong, which works to end gun violence, says CARR generally works like this:?

• A concerned community member brings evidence about potential harm to one’s self or others, and law enforcement can then file a legal petition to remove that person’s guns temporarily?
• A judge will “approve or deny the temporary transfer petition after conducting a strict, independent judicial review.”?
• Should the judge decide to grant the petition, guns belonging to the person in question are handed over temporarily to law enforcement or “a trusted person outside of the owner’s household.”?
• A hearing is then held to determine next steps, which may include “identifying opportunities for important support services for the individual in crisis.”?
• Once the person is not in crisis, the guns are returned.?

It’s unclear what Kentucky’s specific legislation would look like. Westerfield is working on two draft options, he said, which may “change a lot.”?

What are the two CARR options now??

One version of the bill includes the option for law enforcement to approach the person in question and tell them someone brought concerns forward about their safety or the safety of others.?

“It gives the respondent the option,” Westerfield explained. “You can have a hearing within X number of hours, near immediate. Keep your guns until then, not keep your guns — that’s up in the air. Or, you can give us your guns now, and we’ll have a hearing in a week.”?

“The respondent has the burden of defending that in that particular case,” he said. Timelines are adjustable, he added, since there may be practical problems getting a hearing so soon.??

This comes with other problems, too.?

“If you tell someone that you fear has…a mental health issue, or a trauma, something that you’re worried they’re about to break, and then you don’t act with some near immediacy, you might actually provoke the act,” Westerfield said. “That’s the concern. And you’re balancing that risk and that concern with the Second Amendment right that they have and no one disputes that they have.”??

The second version includes an ex parte hearing, which means a hearing could happen without the gun owner in the room.?

This version “still has the law enforcement steps,” Westerfield said. “So, it’s not just anybody on a whim asking for a judge to get your guns. There has to be some articulated, specific reasons” for the move.?

Whitney Austin, who co-founded Whitney Strong after surviving a mass shooting in Cincinnati, told lawmakers that “we know that misuse of firearms is not tied to law-abiding, mentally well gun owners. CARR was not created for them.”??

She added: “CARR was created to surgically identify the small subset of gun owners, including those in lawful possession of a firearm, who are on the brink of misusing their guns to harm themselves or others.”

Sheila Schuster, a licensed psychologist and the Executive Director of the KY Mental Health Coalition, told the Lantern that she supports CARR.?

At the same time, “The truth is that people with a mental illness are 10 times more likely to be a victim of violent crime than to be a perpetrator,” she said.?

“At the point that someone commits an act, particularly hurting someone else, it’s very likely that they are suffering with rage, with paranoia and in terms of feeling like somebody has done something to wrong them and they’re gonna (get) revenge,” Schuster explained.?

Additionally, Schuster said, suicidal people taking their lives happen at an “astronomical percentage higher if there’s a gun within reach than if there’s not.”?

In a statement provided to lawmakers about the legislation, Schuster also said: “As a psychologist and mental health advocate, I am painfully aware of the stigma of mental illness and the confusion in the minds of many people that mass shooters are undoubtedly mentally ill. This is not the case and the CARR legislation does a very good job of not adding to nor reinforcing that false narrative.”?

Currently, Kentucky does have a statute that requires mental health professionals to warn potential victims if a client makes a threat to someone’s safety.?

Additionally, Kentuckians who are mentally ill and at risk of harming themselves or others and can benefit from treatment can be involuntarily hospitalized if that is “the least restrictive alternative mode of treatment presently available.”?

Richard Sanders, the Chief of Police in Jeffersontown, Kentucky, told lawmakers on behalf of CARR that police are “faced with things today that I’ve never seen before.”

“One of the biggest problems we face in law enforcement,” he said, “is people suffering from mental illness.”

Some people, he said, “shouldn’t have access to a weapon.”

‘Meaningfully different’ than ‘red flag’ laws?

Westerfield said the bill he will file is “meaningfully different in a couple of ways” from so-called “red flag” laws.?

“First of all, the timelines are shorter,” he said. “The burden of proof is going to be higher.”?

Rep. Savannah Maddox, R-Dry Ridge, reiterated her “long standing opposition to this proposal” and concern that it has the potential to violate constitutional rights such as due process and protection against government search and seizure.?

“When law enforcement comes to seize the firearms, do they automatically know where to find them?” she asked.? “Are they told where to find them? Do they dig through the entirety of the house?” She worries this could lead to a registry of some kind, she said.?

Westerfield said he isn’t proposing any kind of “search” or “ransacking of a home.”?

“I think it’s on the honor system,” he said.?

“We must fervently resist any effort to pass gun control legislation,” Maddox said. “And we must be serious about analyzing the data and putting a stop to these ineffective policies that put innocent citizens in harm’s way. And we have to encourage privately held entities to do the same.”

Rep. Pamela Stevenson, D-Louisville, said “with every right there’s a responsibility,” in comments supporting the measure.

“We’ve got to be brave enough,” she said, “to not let people just die nilly-willy.”

Republican Rep. Jared Bauman speaks about an omnibus anti-crime plan backed by Louisville GOP state representatives, Sept. 26, 2023. (Kentucky Lantern photo by McKenna Horsley)

LOUISVILLE — Republican state representatives from Louisville plan to file an 18-point omnibus bill in the next legislative session that aims to tackle an “epidemic of crime in our commonwealth,” said the bill’s lead sponsor, Rep. Jared Bauman.?

The bill, which focuses mostly on issues within Louisville and Jefferson County, is backed by seven Republicans and will be reviewed in a Dec. 15 meeting of the Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary. Speaking in a Tuesday afternoon press conference at the River City Fraternal Order of Police headquarters, Bauman said the legislation will give support to law enforcement while adding harsher penalties to criminals.?

“We remain committed to taking serious and meaningful action to support the restoration of stability and society by supporting Kentucky families, supporting our law enforcement and ensuring that our great Commonwealth has the strongest policy possible to hold criminals accountable for their actions,” Bauman said.?

The General Assembly, which has a Republican supermajority in both the House and Senate, will return to Frankfort in January, after Kentucky voters choose their next governor — either? incumbent Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear or Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron.?

Some proposals in the Louisville Republicans’ plan, such as changing? the state parole board and establishing a Kentucky State Police post in Jefferson County, are part of Cameron’s previously released crime plan. The attorney general expressed support for the legislation in a Tuesday statement.?

Beshear has said that adding a post in Louisville “shows a lack of confidence” in the Louisville Metro Police Department.?

House Republican Whip Jason Nemes, another Louisville lawmaker, said the goal is to make residents feel safe in their communities.?

“When we walk around in our districts, what we hear all around Louisville, all around Kentucky is, ‘Crime’s out of control. I want to go downtown, but I feel unsafe,’” Nemes said. “And so what we’re trying to do is we’re trying to make people safe and make them feel safe.”

According to the Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit data tracker, Kentucky has had 590 incidents of gun violence since the start of this year. Louisville has had 324 incidents in that time frame. The next highest number of incidents was 73 in Lexington.

According to data from Jan. 1, 2022 to Sept. 26, 2022, 626 incidents were reported in Kentucky and Louisville had 306 incidents. Lexington had 120 incidents in that timeframe.?

Louisville made national headlines earlier this year when a gunman entered the Old National Bank downtown and killed five people. At the time, Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg called on the General Assembly to allow cities to make their own policies to tackle gun violence. State law prohibits local governments from enacting regulations on guns or ammunition.

When asked if anything would be added to the bill to give cities more local control regarding gun violence laws, Bauman said lawmakers are open to hearing more from key stakeholders including Greenberg.?

“We are very eager to, again, as the legislative process plays out over the next three months, work on ways to sharpen the Safer Kentucky Act and really make it the best version possible for the Commonwealth,” Bauman said.?

What’s in the plan

Here’s the 18 points in the Safer Kentucky Act, according to a press release:?

• Create a “three strikes law” for violent persistent felony offenders, which would require life without probation or parole for those convicted of a violent felony that doesn’t qualify as a capital offense if the person already has two separate violent felony convictions on their criminal record. This would also allow the death penalty to be used if the third violent felony is a capital offense.?
• Allow the death penalty or life without parole for people who knowingly sell fentanyl or a fentanyl derivative to someone when the consumption of the substance causes death.?
• Make providing contraband substances — such as fentanyl, carfentanil and fentanyl derivatives — within a jail, prison, or other type of detention center a Class B felony, which carries a sentence between 10 to 20 years.
• Establish a Kentucky State Police post in Jefferson County.?
• Regulate bail fund organizations by preventing charitable organizations from furnishing bail of $5,000 or more; making it unlawful to give bail in any amount for an offense of domestic violence or for a person being held under a civil court order or warrant pursuant to Casey’s Law; requiring those who post bail to give photo ID; and requiring charitable bail organizations to give annual reports to the Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary and make the reports available online. This part of the legislation is named “Madelynn’s Law” after Madelynn Troutt, a 17-year-old who died in a head-on car crash in 2021. A bail organization had posted bond for the driver before the accident. A judge dismissed a lawsuit against the organization in 2022.?
• Allow business employees and owners to “use a reasonable amount of force necessary” for self-protection, stop someone detained from escaping and prevent the loss of goods for sale. This would also give civil and criminal immunity for the employees and owners.?
• Increase penalties for people convicted of attempted murder by requiring them to serve at least 85% of their sentence before becoming eligible for early release and adding attempted murder to the violent offense statute.?
• Require parents to attend juvenile court hearings. The act would also create a fine up to $500 and require up to 40 hours of community service for those who violate the law.?
• Require identification cards or operator’s licenses to be issued to eligible felony offenders as part of re-entering society after incarceration.?
• Create a carjacking statute that would make carjacking a Class C felony, which carries a five to 10 year sentence. If the carjacker causes serious physical injury, the crime would rise to a Class B felony and become a capital offense if the victim dies.?
• Increase penalties for vandalism of public or private property.
• Prevent a person from being eligible for any form of release before completing their sentence if they used a firearm that was possessed in violation of a state law.?
• Allow those with eligible mental illness to be remanded to a sheriff or peace officer’s custody when discharged. The goal is to allow mental health treatment facilities and law enforcement to better coordinate for treatment and transport.?
• Create a state law to allow law enforcement officers to use wiretapping in investigations.?
• Change laws regarding the auction of confiscated guns to allow citizens to bid on murder weapons that will be destroyed by state police. This would allow the gun to remain off the street after being used in a crime while continuing to allow police to collect funds from the sale.?
• Add provisions to prevent street camping on “public streets, sidewalks, paths, or public areas normally used by pedestrians and/or vehicles, private property, homes, or businesses in any way.”?
• Require the death penalty in cases where a law enforcement officer has been murdered.?
• Change the Kentucky Parole Board to allow a governor to remove members and require an unanimous vote of three six-member panels to approve parole.

Chief Jacqueline Gwinn-Villaroel speaks to media Thursday morning. (LMPD)

A Louisville police officer is in critical condition after being shot in the torso during an early morning traffic stop.

Louisville Metro Police Department Chief Jacquelin Gwinn-Villaroel said ?shots were fired from a nearby house as the officer conducted a traffic stop around 2 a.m. in the 4000 block of Kentucky Street.

A supporting officer fired his weapon but was not injured, she said.?

A hostage-negotiating and SWAT team were dispatched to the house, Gwinn-Villaroel said.

WLKY of Louisville reports there was a standoff at the house for more than six hours, and at least two, possibly more, people were brought out in handcuffs.?

The officer underwent surgery at the University of Louisville Hospital, LMPD reports, and was in critical and stable condition.

Rookie Police Officer Nickolas Wilt was shot in the head as he approached the building in Louisville where a mass shooter lay in wait after spraying his coworkers with automatic weapon fire on April 10, 2023. Officer Cory Galloway, who was training Wilt, killed the gunman and also was wounded. Louisville Police Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel gave Wilt a fist bump as he left Frazier Rehabilitation Institute in late July of 2023. Five people died in the shooting at Old National Bank. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Sarah Ladd)

Louisville Metro Police Officer Nickolas Wilt headed home Friday for the first time in months.?

Waiting for him: his own bed and a much-anticipated steak dinner.?

He rolled out of Frazier Rehabilitation Institute in a wheelchair around noon, past smiling scrubs-clad staff, police officers, politicians and members of the press.?

Before exiting the building, he gave a fist bump to a smiling Police Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel.?

Wilt’s survival and physical improvement is, doctors said Friday, miraculous. He took a gunshot to the head on April 10, while responding to a shooting at Old National Bank in downtown Louisville during his fourth shift on the force.?

“I’ll be honest, I was surprised they were able to get Officer Wilt off the table that first day after what I saw,” said Dr. Jason Smith, UofL Health’s chief medical officer. “The fact that they were able to do that, to start this process, is a miracle in and of itself.”?

Wilt was one of nine people injured at the bank after a gunman brought an AR-15 he bought legally into his place of work and killed six of his coworkers. Wilt’s field training officer, Cory Galloway, killed the shooter.?

Louisville rallied around the young officer, hailing him a hero and following his recovery closely as he moved from critical care to, eventually, rehab.?

That community support helped with Wilt’s recovery, Dr. Darryl Kaelin, the medical director at Frazier, said. He also showed an “incredible will to survive.”?

Wilt’s brother, Zack, said that he eagerly does his physical therapy.?

“It’s a long road, it’s a marathon,” Zack said. “But Nick, every single day, has been ready to go.”?

He also has the support of a family that is “aggressive” in their fight for him and his improved health, Chief? Gwinn-Villaroel said.?

“They’re strong,” she said. “They have a pitbull mentality. They are just aggressive in their need and their desire to get better.”?

They’ll need that mentality in the coming months. Kaelin with Frazier Rehab said that Wilt will begin outpatient therapy next week – five days a week.?

The therapy will include walking, arm strength, self care rehab skills like bathing and dressing, cognitive therapy for improved speech and memory, and more.?

Beyond the physical, it will take time for the mind to heal, said Smith.?

“It’s a long process, the psychological toll things like this: the idea of removing your safety,” Smith said. “It’s difficult to reestablish that. And it can often take months, if not years, to come to the realization that: ‘this isn’t going to happen to me again.’ That: ‘statistics would say I’m not going to undergo a gun violence episode again.’”?

‘Make gun violence a plague of the past.’

Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg took the opportunity to again condemn gun violence. Right after the mass shooting, he said the state should let the city make its own policy choices around guns.?

After the mass shooting, 16 Kentucky Democratic lawmakers proposed policies that they believe could help curb gun violence. They included red flag laws, voluntary “do not sell” lists for suicidal individuals and more. They hope to bring forward legislation to match the policies next session.?

Their Republican colleagues, who have the legislative majority, were largely silent about any potential legislation surrounding guns. Republican primary candidates for governor, however, denounced gun control efforts.?

Daniel Cameron, the primary winner, previously said that “The Second Amendment is sacrosanct” and that it needs to be protected in Kentucky.?

“Let’s never forget, and let’s take action together,” Greenberg said. “Let’s fight to protect officers like Officer Wilt who can work every day to save others; let’s fight to protect every child, every son and daughter across our city from the fear of gun violence. And let’s fight together to make gun violence a plague of the past.”?

Chronic absenteeism has risen among students in Kentucky's public schools. (Getty Images)

FRANKFORT — Kentucky lawmakers on Tuesday launched a review of recent laws aimed at making schools safer as a special Task Force on School and Campus Security met for the first time.?

In response to a 2018 school shooting at Marshall County High School, in which two students were killed and more than a dozen injured, the General Assembly passed the School Safety and Resiliency Act in 2019. Gov. Andy Beshear signed the measure into law.?

Sen. Max Wise, R-Campbellsville, sponsor of the 2019 act, told lawmakers Monday that 28 other states have adopted part or all of Kentucky’s school safety law. Wise is co-chair of the task force.

Among the law’s provisions was a requirement that? every school have a school resource officer (SRO) and that entrances and classroom doors be secured with specific locking systems.

Other laws, 2020’s Senate Bill 8 and 2022’s House Bill 63, amended the original act. The SRO provision was later changed to require school boards to have at least one officer per campus.?

During the interim, or the time between regular General Assembly sessions, committees and task forces meet to study issues in preparation for drafting and enacting new laws.?

Crime in Kentucky was down in 2022 compared with the previous year. (Photo by Brandon Bell, Getty Images)

When shots ring out on the South and West sides of Chicago, Sam Castro and his team at the Institute for Nonviolence Chicago race to the scene of the shooting and to the hospital where emergency responders are treating the gunshot victim.

Knowing most of the city’s gun violence is caused by a small cluster of people who are usually gang-affiliated, the group wants to prevent the often-expected retaliation shooting by intervening in victims’ lives to stop the cycle of violence and the revolving doors of the hospital.

Castro, the organization’s director of community violence intervention, and his colleagues meet gunshot victims at their hospital beds and walk the streets of the Austin, Back of the Yards, Brighton Park and West Garfield Park neighborhoods, talking with those who are at a high risk of committing or being the victim of gun violence. They offer individualized “wraparound” support services, whether being a caseworker, delivering food or helping residents find and keep jobs.

Like many of the people who run these programs nationally, Castro has personal experience with gun violence. He’s been shot three times, the first when he was 3.

He became part of the gun violence cycle as a gang leader, spending 12 years in state and federal prison. He wanted something better for his children and community through “relentless engagement.” It’s his calling, he said.

“It’s hard,” Castro told Stateline. “We’ve been through some traumatic stuff. We’ve got to figure out how to heal the people in the community while still running into this gunfire.”

Now the Institute for Nonviolence Chicago and similar organizations nationwide have a new opportunity to expand their work. A massive injection of federal grant money, beyond the private philanthropy that has previously sustained their mission, will help more programs offer an alternative to law enforcement that, supporters say, gets at the root drivers of violence.

“We’re investing in the people in communities that have been disinvested for generations,” said William Simpson, the director of violence reduction initiatives at Equal Justice USA, a nonprofit that advocates for public funding for these programs in states like California, Louisiana, New Jersey and North Carolina.

“Folks are doing the lifesaving work and never getting the resources they need to do it,” Simpson said. “The dollars are allocated, but there’s so much more work.”

He and Castro were among roughly 700 experts from 200 organizations in 45 cities who gathered last week at a community violence intervention conference in Los Angeles, hosted by the Giffords Center for Violence Intervention. The program launched last year within the national gun safety organization led by former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona, a mass shooting survivor.

Part pep talk, part professional development seminar, the conference gave people from some of the deadliest and economically depressed cities in the country a chance to share their strategies for curbing urban gun violence, tapping new funding streams and getting more state and city money.

Feds invest big

Through its Community Violence Intervention and Prevention Initiative, the Biden administration recently freed up $50 million in grants for community violence intervention programs. This comes on top of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which President Joe Biden signed last year, allocating $250 million over the next five years for these programs.

This is the largest federal investment in community violence intervention programs in U.S. history, said Amy Solomon, the assistant attorney general of the Office of Justice Programs in the U.S. Department of Justice.

So far, the feds have dished out $100 million in grants and will allocate an additional $100 million by September.

“These are not our resources, these are your resources,” she told the conference. “Collectively, we can save lives and build safer communities.”

Community violence intervention programs embrace a nonpunitive way to prevent chronic gun violence. The programs work to interrupt the cycle of violence by working with people who are at highest risk through the provision of individually tailored support services, said Paul Carrillo, vice president of the Giffords Center for Violence Intervention.

Long studied and lauded by academics and activists as an alternative to law enforcement-focused responses, these programs are starting to get the attention of leaders from city, state and federal government, and money is beginning to flow into the programs.

The federal money available, however, is far less than the $5 billion that Biden proposed in 2021, following a 30% surge in homicides in 2020. But the president has told state and local leaders that they also can use American Rescue Plan money for community violence intervention programs.

Still, Carrillo, who grew up around gun violence in Southeast Los Angeles and started his career at a hospital-based violence intervention program, added a warning to activists and program leaders at the conference.

“As the old saying goes, when there’s more money there’s more problems,” he said.

The influx of federal dollars is an extraordinary opportunity for community groups to get much needed funding, said Connie Rice, a civil rights lawyer who helped reshape the Los Angeles Police Department through lawsuits and working within the department. She also created community safety partnerships that reduced the city’s violent crime rate over the past three decades.

But she cautioned that it is very difficult to distribute money effectively.

The work must be grounded in specific programs to address specific violence challenges in specific neighborhoods, or the programs will fail, she warned.

“When you have a lot of money, it’s like a gold rush,” said Rice, who co-founded the Urban Peace Institute. “You have got to do it in consultation and co-development with the groups that are most experienced and expert on the ground working.”

Those local groups, however, often don’t have the administrative capacity to apply for and dole out public dollars, she said; groups need intermediaries.

New money is also flowing in from cities and states. In 2017, five states invested $60 million in community violence intervention programs. By 2021, 15 states invested $700 million. Those programs and the funding continue to expand.

Last year, California announced $156 million in community intervention grants. Democratic lawmakers in the Golden State have also proposed legislation this year that would tax firearm sales to fund more community violence intervention programs. The bill passed the Assembly in May and is being considered in the state Senate.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, who took office in December, will launch the Office of Community Safety to lead violence intervention initiatives to lower gun deaths through nonprofit partnerships.

The Los Angeles City Council heeded the mayor’s budget request to raise the starting salary for community intervention workers from $40,000 to $60,000 — a livable wage for people who have made communities safer for years, said Deputy Mayor Karren Lane, who heads the new office. But often, she argued, they have not gotten the credit they deserve.

“Homicides are down in Los Angeles because everyday people with lived experience, deep relationships in communities, put their lives on the line and disrupt violence,” she said. Indeed, after a spike in 2020, mirroring a national increase, homicides fell in 2022.?

Lane added, “While law enforcement may play a role, we also realize that once paramedics are called, police officers are called, emergency operating centers are established, we have already lost.”

An alternative to policing

The role of police in urban gun violence prevention has been contentious, especially as law enforcement agencies are funded substantially more than community-led programs. Many of the program leaders have been personally affected by police violence.

In March, police in New Jersey shot and killed Najee Seabrooks, a member of the Paterson Healing Collective. Seabrooks, whose job was to work with people who are at a high risk to commit or be the victim of gun violence, was having a mental health crisis when he was confronted by police at his home. He was wielding knives, according to police.

Members of the Paterson Healing Collective, trained in de-escalation and mediation, pleaded with police to allow them to talk to Seabrooks but were denied, despite Seabrooks asking for his colleagues’ help. He should be alive today, said Casey Melvin, the field operations manager for the organization.

“We’re still reeling from that,” he said.

Solomon, at the U.S. Department of Justice, asked the activists and program leaders gathered in Los Angeles last week how they can identify new opportunities for communities and police to “come together and leverage each other’s collective strengths.”

While she acknowledged that it was a “complicated ask in a complicated time,” she implored the room to realize they can’t do it alone.

This is an opportunity to show that community violence intervention can become even more effective, said Simpson, of Equal Justice USA.

Community violence intervention programs need multiyear funding from both private philanthropy and governments to create a sustainable infrastructure that lasts, he said. The current federal investment is a “drop in the bucket,” he said, and needs to increase consistently over time to reduce gun violence.

“We’re not just going to arrest our way out of this,” Simpson said.

Stateline is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott Greenberger for questions: [email protected]. Follow Stateline on Facebook and Twitter.?

A line of police officers stand during a community vigil honoring the victims of the Louisville mass shooting on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, at the Muhammad Ali Center plaza in Louisville, Kentucky. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Abbey Cutrer)

A Louisville police officer who was injured while trying to stop a mass shooter in early April is making “remarkable progress,” his family said Thursday.?

Officer Nickolas Wilt took a gunshot to the head on April 10 while responding to a shooting at Old National Bank in downtown Louisville.?

He was one of nine people who were injured when a gunman brought a legally-purchased AR-15 into his place of work and killed five coworkers.?

Cory Galloway, Wilt’s field training officer, killed the shooter and was also wounded. Wilt was working his fourth shift as a police officer when he was injured on April 10.?

Wilt “is now able to respond more consistently to yes/no questions, indicating improved cognitive function,” the family reported via the Louisville Metro Police Department on social media.?

“Although his speech remains limited to 1-2 words at a time and is not yet consistent, he is making daily strides in this area as well,” the family said.?

With the help of a harness, Wilt has also started walking again “and is working on regaining strength in his legs.”?

Wilt, who was hospitalized for a month following his injury, battled with pneumonia and other lung complications.?

He’s now brushing his teeth with “minimal assistance,” the family said.?

“His determination and fighting spirit are evident as he confronts his challenges head-on and still isn’t backing down,” his family said. “Officer Wilt’s progress is truly inspiring, and his determination is a testament to his resilience. The journey towards full recovery may still be ongoing, but every day brings new advancements and achievements.”?

Betsy Bryant signs a makeshift memorial display for a victim of the mass shooting in Louisville during the community vigil on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, at the Muhammad Ali Center plaza in Louisville, Kentucky. Kentucky Lantern photo by Abbey Cutrer

The morning after Kentucky’s primary elections, when all talk centered on newly-minted GOP nominee Daniel Cameron and whether or not he would pick Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles as his running partner, I was sitting on my back porch, reading about the recovery of Louisville Police Officer Nick Wilt.

Wilt was shot in the head five weeks ago during a mass shooting at Old National Bank, and survived. He is 26 years old. According to WDRB news, “Wilt has remained in critical condition and battled pneumonia before he was able to be taken off a ventilator. He was moved to Frazier Rehab on May 10, where he has “shown signs of improvement during his first week.”

I also came across an article about the one-year anniversary on May 24 of the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, so I went inside, poured another cup of coffee, and went back out onto the porch to read about that, too.

That is when I realized I had forgotten the details (19 children and two teachers were murdered, plus 17 wounded) and I felt a sick pit in my stomach. It was only a year ago. How is it possible to forget something like this?

And yet, we know how we forget, don’t we?

We forget because there are so many shootings and mass shootings we can’t keep up.

— BREAKING NEWS —

As I write this, I receive the following alert. “Law enforcement officials are working the scene of a possible active shooter at the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet building” after “dispatch received a call just before 3 p.m. Wednesday that there was an active shooter in the building.”

I immediately call a friend who works in the Transportation Cabinet. By dumb luck, she is working at home today. I receive a text from another friend saying her niece works nearby and heard shots fired. Another message tells me school kids are on the Capitol grounds and have been evacuated to a nearby church for their safety. A friend who lives in Frankfort emails that there are helicopters. I am told people are being led out of the building with their hands up. A reporter tweets that Frankfort police have no confirmation of an active shooter, casualties, or anyone injured.

Everyone is confused and speculating and panicking. But no one is surprised.

This is how we live.

While I waited for more information, I pulled up Kentucky Educational Television’s May 1 gubernatorial debate and looked for the discussion about guns.

When asked, Cameron responded that the Second Amendment is “sacrosanct” and that he is not interested in discussing anything related to gun control.

Meanwhile, Officer Wilt continues to recover from a gunshot wound to the head. And as I write this, our Transportation Cabinet building is being evacuated because of a suspected shooter. I am no longer interested in how we got here. I am only interested in how we get out.

In the last few days, an 18 year-old killed three and wounded six (including two police officers) in Farmington, New Mexico, after he opened fire on random cars and houses with an AR-15.

In Harris County, Texas, ?a preschooler found an unsecured pistol and shot his 1-year-old sibling. The injuries were not life threatening.

Outside Dallas, “a 12 year-old and a 20 year-old are both facing a murder charge after a restaurant employee was gunned down during an altercation with a customer Saturday night.”

In Shively, Kentucky, on Mother’s Day, a person was shot at an animal hospital. “Police said a fight happened at the animal hospital resulting in the shooting of a 20 year-old man. He was taken to UofL Hospital where he later died from his injuries.”

At a shopping mall in Allen, Texas, “a gunman shot and killed eight people, including three children, and injured at least seven others.” As a mom, I can’t stop thinking about the mothers who were shot to death protecting their children.

In the KET debate, Cameron used the word “sacrosanct” when asked about the Second Amendment. Cameron also says he is pro-life.

Now that he has secured the Republican nomination for governor, he should should be required to tell Kentuckians which is more “sacrosanct”: unfettered access to unsecured firearms with no regulations? Or living, breathing, human beings, including our children?

I dread his answer.

This column was updated to clarify that May 24 is the one-year anniversary of the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.

Credit: Kentucky Blood Center

Saying the need for blood “doesn’t take a vacation” the Kentucky Blood Center is asking the public to donate in the coming months.

As part of an “SOS” – Save our Summer – campaign, the center will give away tickets to amusement park Kings Island, LexLive movie tickets, gift cards, Rupp Arena concert tickets and, of course, T-shirts.?

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many have stopped giving blood, which left Kentucky – and the nation – in a critical blood shortage.?

And even though the supply has somewhat stabilized, people tend not to donate as much in the warmer months.?

“We tend to have to work harder in the summer to collect blood to serve local patients at hospitals throughout the state,” Mandy Brajuha, vice president of external relations for the KBC, said in a statement.?

“Historically, an uptick in transfusions at any point in the summer can really put us in a tough position due to the drop off in donations,” Brajuha added. “Blood must be on the shelves when need arises.”

Blood donation centers recently urged even more donations following mass shootings in Louisville. Treating the injured took dozens of donations. People who get shot need 10 times more blood during transfusions than people injured other ways – like car wrecks or stabbings, according to Johns Hopkins.?

Kentucky has had more than 260 shootings in which 191 people were injured so far in 2023. Following the deadly Old National Bank shooting on April 10, many first-time donors signed up to give blood.?

But, the need is still there – especially for those who are O-Negative, a universal type that can be used to treat people of other blood types.?

“Although we’ve seen a modest increase in donors to start 2023 in comparison to the last few years, we still haven’t returned to pre-pandemic levels, which is worrisome entering the always-difficult summer months,” Brajuha said.?

According to the center, donations last year were 12% lower than in 2019, a pre-pandemic year.

Meanwhile, the need for blood did not drop.?

The incentives

People will get Kings Island tickets when they donate blood through the Kentucky Blood Center on these dates:?

• May 15-16: Beaumont and Andover (Lexington)
• May 22-23: Frankfort, Somerset and Tri-County (Corbin)
• June 5-6: Hillview and Middletown (Louisville) and Pikeville

Folks who donate on June 9 at Central Bank Center in Lexington from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. will get:?

• A T-shirt?
• A LexLive movie ticket?
• Donors at this event will also be entered to win tickets to WWE Friday Night Smackdown on June 16 or Thomas Rhett on June 22 and Guns N’ Roses on Sept. 6 at Rupp Arena.?

To make an appointment to give blood through KBC: ?

• Visit kybloodcenter.org or
• Call 800.775.2522
• Check out a mobile drive at my.kybloodcenter.org/donor/schedules/county.?

Eligibility?

To give blood, you must be 17 or have parental consent at age 16. You must weigh no less than 110 pounds, be healthy and have photo identification.?

Citing the need for blood donation inclusivity, the United States Food and Drug Administration on Thursday paved the way for men who have sex with men to be able to give blood without abstaining from intercourse for three months before donating.?

Now, donors will answer risk-assessment questions regardless of sexual orientation.?

Still, donors will have to wait to donate if they are on HIV medications or report recent anal sex.?

These rules contribute to stigmatization of the community, Chris Hartman, the executive director of Kentucky’s Fairness Campaign, told the Lantern.?

“There are still disparities that disproportionately affect the LGBTQ community” when it comes to blood donations, he said.?

“I’m glad the FDA is continuing to update the rules,” he added. “(But) it is obvious they are still not listening to our community clearly.”?

First responders gathered the morning of April 10 in downtown Louisville near the scene of a mass shooting at Old National Bank near Slugger Field. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Liam Niemeyer)

A Louisville police officer who was wounded trying to stop a mass shooter in early April is no longer on a ventilator, the Metro Police Foundation said Monday.?

Officer Nickolas Wilt took a gunshot to the head on April 10 while responding to a shooting at Old National Bank in downtown Louisville.

He’s been hospitalized for nearly a month since the mass shooting but went off life-support equipment on Monday, the foundation said.?

Wilt has pneumonia and “other lung complications,” but “overall his progress is remarkable,” according to the foundation. He?may start neurological rehabilitation soon and can follow some commands now.?

Wilt was one of nine people injured at the bank when a gunman brought an AR-15 he bought legally into his place of work and killed five of his coworkers. (A sixth person died later). Wilt’s field training officer, Cory Galloway, killed the shooter and was wounded.?

After the mass shooting, much-needed blood donations poured in, many from first-time donors. UofL Health medical staff used 170 units of blood to treat those injured in the shooting and asked the public to help replenish the supply.?

O-negative blood is most needed, but all types are encouraged.?

Follow these links to make an appointment to give blood near your ZIP code:

• https://www.redcrossblood.org/give.html/drive-results?zipSponsor=40203
• https://my.kybloodcenter.org/donor/schedules/geo

A makeshift memorial to the victims of the mass shooting at Old National Bank in Louisville on April 10. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Abbey Cutrer)

This story mentions suicide and gun violence. If you or someone you know is contemplating suicide, please call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988.?

LOUISVILLE – Nearly 100 Kentuckians have died from gunfire so far this year — and some lawmakers think a public health approach is the best way to halt the violence.?

As of May 6, national nonprofit Gun Violence Archive showed Kentucky had 261 shootings in which 88 people died and 191 others were injured. (COVID-19 killed 354 Kentuckians this year as of May 4, state data shows).?

In response to the gun violence, 16 Kentucky Democratic lawmakers proposed six policies that they believe could help.?

The policies include red flag laws, legal responsibility to safely store a weapon, voluntary “do not sell” lists for suicidal individuals and more. They hope to bring forward legislation to match the policies next session.?

The public impact of mass shootings:?

Seven people died in two mass shootings in a single week in Louisville, which moved gun violence to center stage for many Kentuckians.

“Mass shootings have a particular hold on our community, because often … they’re at public locations,” said Rep. Nima Kulkarni, D-Louisville. “I think it’s just a question of how it impacts the community, how it publicly impacts the community and provides an opportunity, in essence, for the community to come together… in grief and in discussing the impact.”?

It also matters who the victims are, fellow Louisville Democrat Rep. Keturah Herron said.?

“Mostly the victims of gun violence (in Louisville) have been young Black men and boys, teenagers,” Herron said. “When you look at what happened at Old National Bank, it just hit a larger number of people and it hit individuals who normally … aren’t impacted.”?

The Kaiser Family Foundation reported in 2020 that white Kentuckians died by gunfire at a rate of 17.4 per 100,000 while that number was 47.6 for Black Kentuckians.

Overall, Kentucky had a higher rate of death by gunfire (20.1 per 100,000) than the nation (13.6 per 100,000).

“The public pays attention to a mass shooting in a different way,” said Rep. Lisa Willner, D-Louisville. “And so it’s not that it’s inherently more tragic than any other kind of a loss to gun violence, but that while the community is paying attention, maybe we can actually move some of these initiatives that have been on the books for a while. It may be there’s more of a public outcry and really a demand for for those of us in Frankfort to do something.”?

‘My job is to put bodies back together.’?

Among those calling on leadership to act is UoL Health chief medical officer and trauma surgeon Dr. Jason Smith.

Smith went viral after he pleaded with lawmakers to do something about gun violence following the Old National Bank shooting.

In Washington D.C. in late April, Smith joined the Gun Violence Prevention Task Force alongside Congressman Morgan McGarvey, D-Louisville, and others.?

Smith has repeatedly said that while the mass shooting was traumatic, he sees many shootings outside of mass tragedies.?

“Two weeks ago today I became the most recent addition to a horrible but growing cadre of surgeons nurses across this country that have had to respond to a mass shooting,” Smith said.?

Each shooting is a “horrible and tragic event,” he added. “And it’s also one I see every single day in my hospital.”?

Since Louisville’s mass shooting at the bank, he’s urged lawmakers to work together on solutions.?

In addition to the toll deaths take, treating nonfatal gunshots is expensive.?

The U.S. Government Accountability Office reported in 2021 that treating gunshot wounds costs about $1 billion a year, according to 2016 and 2017 data.?

The American Public Health Association says around 85,000 people are injured by guns every year and more than 38,000 people are killed. ?

Gun violence, the APHA says, is “a major public health problem and a leading cause of premature death.”?

Smith said that while he responded to the bank mass shooting, two other unrelated shooting victims came into the hospital for his help. Between the mass shootings that book-ended that week in early April, he treated 18 other gunshot wounds.?

“I don’t know the solutions. … I’m a doctor. My job is to put bodies back together after these tragedies,” Smith said in D.C. this week. “I can’t heal the scars of the community. I can’t heal the spirit that is broken when this happens and I cannot bring back the losses that we suffer. But I can pray and ask all of you, no matter what side of this issue you are on, to step forward and begin to dialogue…”?

The proposed policies: ?

The 16 Democrat representatives and senators want to see the following policies enacted in Kentucky:?

• Extreme risk protection orders – sometimes called “red flag laws” – that could temporarily restrict a person’s access to firearms if they are at immediate risk of harming others or themselves.?
• Establishing a statewide Office for Safer Communities that will receive funding to gather data on gun violence and make it widely available.?
• Let cities and counties regulate firearm and ammunition possession, transfer and transportation.?
• Require background checks with every private firearm purchase.?
• Allow people who are suicidal to voluntarily place their name on a “do not sell” list while they feel in danger of ending their life. This policy would also allow people to easily remove their name from the list once the danger is past.?
• Require safe storage of firearms within the home. This would hold gun owners legally and possibly criminally responsible if they failed to secure their gun and their child took it and committed a crime with it, for example.?

Herron said the state needs to approach work on gun violence in much the same way as tobacco and COVID-19.?

“Especially as far as suicides that we’re seeing in community, what does it look like to have some type of public health campaign, whether it’s PSAs or bulletin boards, or things at bus stops to help inform people what they can do, what are solutions other than taking their own lives, or other than using a gun,” she said.?

Several Republican lawmakers, including legislative leaders, declined to speak with the Lantern ?about the proposed Democratic policies. For decades, the trend in Kentucky’s legislature has been to loosen gun laws and regulations.

Republicans vying to be the next governor expressed opposition to gun control measures during the candidate debate on KET. Several, however, said it’s important to have conversations about mental health.

Candidate Kelly Craft told moderator Renee Shaw that “I’m not touching the Second Amendment and due process.”

“We need to make certain that we follow the rules that are currently written,” said Craft. “And we have to open the conversation of mental health, of mental illness.”

Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles agreed, saying “we need to shift the focus to mental health.”

Fox News published poll results in late April that showed Americans support gun control measures: 87% of voters surveyed supported background checks for guns; 81% want enforcement of current gun laws; 81% want people to have to be 21 years old to buy any gun; 80% want required mental health checks; 80% want people at risk to themselves to be flagged as so; and 77% favored a waiting period when purchasing firearms.

Among Republican voters, Fox also found, 36% want to ban assault weapons; 61% want more citizens to carry guns.

The Pew Research Center reported in April that the majority of gun-related deaths are suicides.?

PSAs and other education can be help address community violence, Herron said, and how folks talk about trauma and healing. That starts with data collection on gun violence in all 120 counties, she said.?

“I don’t think that there’s just one solution,” she said. “I think that there’s going to be multiple solutions. But I think that if we leave out this public health component, I don’t think that any piece of legislation we pass … is going to be beneficial.”?

Rep. Sarah Stalker, D-Louisville, said it’s important to create stable environments for communities as well.?

“There are things we can do to respect people’s rights to own a gun,” she said, “But to have common sense laws to help protect people just like you would with anything.”?

Candidate Quarles also said on KET that he believes there is a need for more gun safety training, but said the issue of lockboxes for guns falls under “personal decision for families.”

Candidate Alan Keck said keeping murder weapons from reuse is a potential “olive branch.” Kentucky law now requires that firearms confiscated by police be sold at public auction.

“I think it’s insane,” said Keck, “that those are being sold to the highest bidder… That should not be a showpiece. It’s a murder weapon and I can’t imagine that grieving family knowing that that gun is going to somebody else’s mantle.”

Frontrunner Daniel Cameron said he won’t “support any kind of gun control.”

“The Second Amendment,” he said, “is sacrosanct. we need to make sure that we protect it for Kentuckians all across the Commonwealth.”

Christopher 2X advocates against violence in Louisville. He said the recent mass shooting was “(a stark) reminder to me that there’s still this appetite to engage in reckless gunplay, whether that becomes just regular neighborhood shootings, domestic violence issues that lead to those kinds of tragedies or that mass shooting.”?

“It’s just a reminder how the appetite is still alive and well,” he said.??

2X runs a nonprofit called Game Changers that, through a variety of programs, “promotes early childhood education, parental involvement, mentoring, and community involvement to positively transform the lives of children and young people, end violence long term, and make communities safer in the Louisville area,” per its website.?

There’s no one answer to ending gun violence, he said. It’s going to take a lot of people and organizations working together.?

“I don’t really form an opinion on ‘are more restrictive gun laws going to change anything in this city or any city across the United States and specifically in the state of Kentucky?’” he said. “I don’t know the answer to that. But … at the end of the day, it takes a combination of things.”

A lot of the solution goes back to ensuring kids can have healthier childhoods, 2X said, and stop seeing gun violence as an “attractive” route.?

Does Kentucky need a special session to tackle gun violence??

The governor has the power to call a special session in Kentucky before the regular session next January.?

Kulkarni, Herron, Stalker and Willner said there could be benefits to a special session to address gun violence.

But: they don’t want to see important legislation rushed.?

“There’s an argument there for that being a catalyst to come up with something that can be agreed upon and act on it,” said Kulkarni. “But there’s also this danger of doing things not as deliberately and methodically and with all of the angles … considered. That is also a danger if there is a rush to a special session.”?

Assuming there is no special session, in the roughly eight months until the next regular session, Kulkarni said, “it is incumbent on us as state lawmakers to keep focus and attention on the issue.”?

Kulkarni said she looks at the policies suggested as a good meeting ground for both Democrats and Republicans, calling the measures “common sense.”?

“I think that there’s also a group of folks on the other side,” Herron said, “who are not trying to make it political and want to get things done.”?

Working together is what it will take, UofL’s Dr. Smith said in D.C. in April.?

“This is not a ‘they’ problem. There is no ‘they’ in this. This is an ‘us’ problem,” Smith said. “Every community is going to be impacted by gun violence. I pray and hope it is not yours. But the simple statistics will tell you: it will be.”

Candles with the names of four people killed in a mass shooting in Dadeville, Alabama on April 15, 2023 stand with toys and flowers in front of the dance studio where the shooting took place in Dadeville, Alabama on April 19, 2023. At least four people were killed and 32 injured at a Sweet 16 birthday party where the shooting took place. (Jemma Stephenson/Alabama Reflector)

DADEVILLE, Alabama — Three people, including two teenagers, have been arrested in connection with the mass shooting in Dadeville Saturday night that left at least four people dead and 32 injured.

Alabama Law Enforcement Agency spokesman Jeremy Burkett said at a press conference Wednesday morning that Tyreese “Ty Reik” McCullough, 17, and Travis McCullough, 16, both of Tuskegee, had been charged in the shooting.

Burkett said the teenagers were arrested in the shooting. He declined to answer questions about motive or the suspects’ connection with the victims.

Alabama Law Enforcement Agency sent out a news release Wednesday afternoon stating that they had arrested and charged a third individual, Wilson LaMar Hill Jr., 20, of Auburn, at around 2:30 p.m. Wednesday.

The shooting took place at a Sweet 16 party at a dance studio in Dadeville. Marsiah Collins, 19; Philstavious “Phil” Dowdell, 18; Corbin Dahmontrey Holston, 23 ?and Shaunkiva “KeKe” Smith, 17, were killed. ALEA said Tuesday a large number of bullet casing from handguns were recovered from the scene.

Dowdell was the brother of Alexis Dowdell, who was celebrating her 16th birthday at the studio. Mike Segrest, the district attorney for the 5th Judicial Circuit, which includes Dadeville, said her birthday cake had gone uncut and her candles unlit.

ALEA says the three were charged with four counts of “reckless murder.” There is no “reckless murder” charge under the state’s murder statues. An ALEA spokeswoman said Wednesday the agency would have additional information.

Martin Collins, the father of Marsiah Collins, said in a phone interview Wednesday morning that the arrests of the teenagers showed the scope of the tragedy.

“Those two young people lost their lives, as well, due to their reckless disregard for human life,” he said.

Mike Segrest, the district attorney for the 5th Judicial Circuit, which includes Dadeville, said the state would ask for the suspects to be held without bond. A local grand jury that had convened in March could be called to meet again before the next grand jury sits in September, he said.

“That’s unprecedented,” he said. “And hasn’t been done that I’m aware of anytime recently here. This is an unprecedented situation.”

Law enforcement had released little information on the investigation prior to the press conference Wednesday, leading to online speculation and criticism. Segrest said his silence was due to the constitutional rights of the suspects.

“We’re not concerned about the headlines,” said Burkett. “We’re not. We’re worried about mamas.”

Lisa Jones, the mother of a 16-year-old in Dadeville, said after the press conference that her daughter, a cheerleader on a team with Alexis Dowdell, has not gone back to school yet.

“I just want people to let these guys do their job,” she said. “And, you know, quit being so curious about it because it’s people’s lives. These kids got mamas, and, you know, we’re close knit here in Dadeville.”

Brownie Caldwell, the tennis coach at Dadeville High School, said that every person in the school has been affected. She said a lot of kids haven’t returned yet.

“We need to be there for them,” she said. “And we need to love on them and just, you know, just be there for them.”

At the news conference, Dadeville Chief of Police Jonathan Floyd told the gathered media, which included local and national journalists, that the community of Dadeville will be reeling from the aftermath of the shooting long after most of them leave.

“In a few days, most of you are going to be gone,” he said. “Our community is still going to be here.”

A few blocks away from the press conference, a memorial had been set up for the four confirmed victims of the shooting. A graduation bear had the names of Phil Dowdell and KeKe Smith, both Dadeville High School seniors, written on it.

In between welcomes and times for city council meetings, Dadeville City Hall’s electronic sign said “Pray for Dadeville,” “We are brokenhearted and mourn for our precious children” “Dadeville Strong,” and “In loving memory of all affected” in bright red letters.

Elaine Floyd, one of the owners of Floyd’s Seed and Feed in downtown, said Wednesday nothing like this had ever happened in her Dadeville.

She remembered holding hands with everyone in church on Sunday morning and said the town was “dead.” Reporters have been in her store every day since then asking questions.

Releasing the names of the suspects, she said, will help people feel less nervous.

“Dadeville is just a good little town,” she said. “My mother-in-law owned this business and the one across the street for 42 years and never been scared. Never had any reason, and this is the first thing that’s ever happened in all these years. So it will bounce back. And we’ll be back to normal.”?

Speaking on the Senate floor Tuesday, Jay Hovey, R-Auburn, said that there would be discussions about the role of legislators in the aftermath of the shooting, but Hovey said that they can’t “legislate morality.”

“There’ll be discussions on this floor and in legislative bodies across this country about the responsibility of legislators,” Hovey said. “While of course we have we have the responsibility to do everything we can to protect our communities, this war will only be won by changing hearts.”

Hovey is the Senator that represents Dadeville.

Ahead of the Wednesday morning news conference in Dadeville, Arlene Wyckoff, who identified herself as a member of the NAACP and living in Alexander City, said she was “offended” by the comments that Hovey had made.

“I was offended by that because put the blame where it belong: on the gunmakers, on the people that bring them in here giving them out distributing them out to these children,” she said.

After the Wednesday Senate meeting, President Pro Tempore Greg Reed, R-Jasper, said that Dadeville was a “terrible tragedy” with an ongoing investigation in response to a question about gun safety legislation being passed this session.

When asked a follow-up question about the likelihood of legislation making it to the floor, Reed said: “That’s what I want to say today.”

Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to reflect a Wednesday afternoon news release announcing?that a third person had been arrested and charged.

A spokesman for the Kentucky Blood Center says "the most important thing with blood donation is that it needs to be on the shelves when the need arises. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Sarah Ladd)

LOUISVILLE — Hundreds of people who had never before donated blood stepped forward to help following a mass shooting in Louisville a week ago.?

The shooting left five dead, plus the shooter, whom police killed. Nine others were injured, including police officer Nickolas Wilt, who was working his fourth shift as a Louisville police officer when he responded to Old National Bank Monday morning.?

He was shot in the head as he “ran towards the gunfire,” Louisville Police said.

The police department tweeted Monday that a week after being shot, Wilt “remains in critical, but stable condition. The family sees and feels the love.” Of the remaining injured, one died after going to the hospital. The rest went home.?

Louisville medical and political leaders put out a call for blood donations after UofL Hospital staff used 170 units of blood to treat those injured in the shooting.?

That much blood was more than the hospital’s capacity, chief medical officer Dr. Jason Smith previously said. The American Red Cross sent in more.?

In the days following, appointments filled quickly around Louisville.?

“Following these tragedies, the Red Cross has received a tremendous outpouring of support as people seek to roll up a sleeve,” said Remy Kennedy, Red Cross Regional Communications Manager.?

However: “A number of factors help determine donor turnout, including news coverage, drive locations and promotions, so it is difficult to attribute an increase to any single factor,” Kennedy said, adding that people should continue to donate in the weeks and months ahead.?

In the five days after the shooting, the Kentucky Blood Center saw more donors step forward — especially in Louisville — than the two weeks prior to the mass shooting, according to spokesperson Eric Lindsey.?

And a lot of those who signed up were first-time givers.?

From April 10 to April 15, for example, 1,725 people registered to give blood. Of those, 439 were first-time donors.?

That was an increase from 1,567 registrations during April 3-8 with 270 first time donors. There were 1,567 registrations from March 27 to April 1 with 333 first time donors.?

A mobile blood drive in Louisville that incentivized donors with free tickets to a Louisville City FC game, filled. The drive added a second bus “to assist with the outpouring of support,” said Lindsey.?

Of the 66 people who registered to donate as part of that drive, Lindsey said, 51 were first-time donors. That’s a “really encouraging” metric.?

A LaGrange first responder drive to honor of Officer Wilt also reached capacity and had to turn some donors away. That location will likely have another drive this week open to the community, Lindsey said. Of the 35 registered for that drive, 22 were first-time donors, he said.?

It’s important for people with all blood types to keep giving, he said.?

The American Red Cross says red cells last for up to 42 days. Platelets are stored in room temperature for five days and plasma is frozen for up to one year.?

“Blood is a constant, everyday need because of all the uses,” said Lindsey. “In the wake of the mass shooting in Louisville, obviously people want to replenish the supply — which we are extremely grateful for — but the most important thing with blood donation is that it needs to be on the shelves when the need arises.”?

He added: “Whether it’s an unspeakable tragedy, a car accident, an organ transplant, a premature birth or treating a disease like cancer, the best way we can save lives is to make sure there is a healthy supply whenever that particular need arises.”

Follow these links to make an appointment to give blood near your ZIP code:

• https://www.redcrossblood.org/give.html/drive-results?zipSponsor=40203
• https://my.kybloodcenter.org/donor/schedules/geo

Gerald Neal (Photo by LRC Public Information)

Members of Kentucky’s Black Legislative Caucus on Monday implored their colleagues in the General Assembly to address what Rep. George Brown called “an epidemic of gun violence.”?

On the heels of mass shootings in Louisville and Nashville, caucus chair Brown, D-Lexington, said, “We call on our colleagues on the other side of the aisle to help us do the right thing.”

Brown and others spoke at a morning news conference at the Capitol in which they expressed support for the “Tennessee Three,” lawmakers who led protests on the Tennessee House floor demanding gun reforms after three children and three adults were gunned down at a school in Nashville. Two of the three Democrats, both Black men, were expelled from the legislature by the Republican majority but restored to their seats by their local governments.?

Brown said Black legislative caucus members from around the country will be in Tennessee Tuesday for demonstrations of support in Nashville and Knoxville for the expelled lawmakers. “We are standing with our fellow state legislators …? and share their sentiment in the need to pass comprehensive gun control legislation in our states.”

Kentucky Senate Minority Floor Leader Gerald Neal, D-Louisville, said the move in Tennessee to muffle elected Black representatives was a blow to democracy and that their “suppression” is intertwined with the politics of gun safety. “Extreme power” demands “extreme responsibility,” Neal said.

Neal also?expressed optimism that Republican lawmakers in Kentucky will sit down for an “honest and factual” discussion of ideas and “proven methodologies” for stemming the gun-related bloodshed that Neal says is killing urban and rural Kentuckians alike.

“Gun violence is a scourge we must address. We must have open and honest discussion about gun violence. All this ideological stuff, all this strategic stuff in trying to exert power in one way or another is not sufficient because people are literally dying in our communities each and every day,” Neal said.?“The first responsibility of government is to protect the safety of its citizenry. To the extent we do not do all we can to protect life we have failed in our responsibility.”

House Minority Leader Derrick Graham, D-Frankfort, spoke in favor of a “red flag” law allowing judges to temporarily remove firearms from individuals deemed a threat to themselves or others. Graham said 19 states, including Indiana and Florida, have enacted such laws and that judges in Florida have used the law 8,000 times in recent years to remove guns from people considered dangerous.?

Graham likened a “red flag” law’s constitutionality to preventive measures enacted by Kentucky’s legislature, including “Casey’s Law” in 2004, which allows intervention to help someone suffering from addiction and “Tim’s Law” in 2017, protecting people suffering from mental illness.?Such a law would be “one more tool to stop gun violence,” Graham said.

Brown said he has introduced bills in recent sessions limiting assault weapons and ammunition and strengthening background checks on gun buyers but they were never even assigned to a committee.

Brown called on lawmakers to immediately address the now-required sale of firearms confiscated by police in Kentucky. He said guns used “to kill people and violate people’s rights”? do not “need to be put back on the street.”

The lawmakers did not call for a special session of the legislature, however. Only a governor can call lawmakers into special session.

They said they plan to seek discussions with Republican leaders of Kentucky’s legislative supermajority, who have remained silent in response to calls for action after two mass shootings in Louisville in one week. Five victims were killed April 10 at a downtown bank by an employee wielding an AR-15 rifle, who was killed by police. On Saturday two people were killed and four injured when gunfire erupted in Louisville’s crowded Chickasaw Park.

A group of people gather outside the Mahogany’s Masterpiece Dance Studio in Dadeville, Alabama on April 16, 2023. The Alabama Law Enforcement Agency says at least four people were killed in the building on Saturday evening. (Jemma Stephenson/Alabama Reflector)

At least four people were killed and 28 injured in a shooting at a birthday party in Dadeville on Saturday night.

The shootings took place on Broadnax Street around 10:30 p.m., said Sgt. Jeremy Burkett, a spokesman for ALEA, at a press conference Sunday morning. The Alexander City Outlook reported the shootings took place at Mahogany’s Masterpiece, a dance studio.

“There were four lives, not fatalities, lives,” Burkett said.

ALEA officials said Sunday evening that 28 people were injured in the shooting. Heidi Smith, director of marketing for Lake Martin Hospital, said in a statement Sunday 15 teenagers were admitted to the hospital with injuries. Six were treated and released; nine were transferred to other hospitals, and five were in critical condition.

Law enforcement did not share information on arrests or possible suspects. Burkett said in response to a question after a Sunday morning press conference that there was no public safety threat.

“What we’ve dealt with is something that none of you should have to endure,” said Jonathan L. Floyd, the chief of the Dadeville Police Department.

Jaheem Brown said Sunday morning he was at the party last night but left early.

“My heart goes out to all of the families who have to go through this,” he said.

Hayes, the chaplain for the Dadeville High School football team, said Dowdell played football and track for Dadeville High School. Hayes called him an “exceptional” athlete who was set to go to Jacksonville State University, and who was “all business” on the football field.

“Basically everything he did, he did well,” Hayes said about Dowdell.

JSU coach Rich Rodriguez said in a statement Sunday that Dowdell was “a great young man with a bright future.”

“My staff and I are heartbroken and hope that everyone will support his family through this difficult time,” the statement said.

Off the field, Dowdell was a kind and generous young man. Hayes said that people loved Dowdell and Dowdell loved people.

“He was the kind of young man that you’d be proud to call your son,” he said.

ALEA had not released names of the other victims as of Sunday evening.

People in town have a lot of questions, anger and grieving happening at the moment. Hayes said the church is doing their best to help navigate people and said “we need prayers.”

“Everybody hurts,” he said.

Aaron Mace, a pastor at Pine Hill Sunday Adventist Church in Sylacauga and Beacon of Joy Seventh Day Adventist Church in Alex City, said Sunday he drove past the party on Saturday night, about an hour before the shootings. Mace planned to go to Dadeville High School Monday morning to offer support.

The community, he said, was in shock over the incident and the youth of the victims.

“People don’t have the words to say to deal with this,” he said.

A somber afternoon

Dadeville is a city of about 3,000 people near Lake Martin in Tallapoosa County. The city was quiet Sunday afternoon. The only sounds were caused by the wind and the cars driving by businesses, churches and the city hall. A closed pottery store’s wind chimes seemed like the loudest sound. The sounds of an ice cream truck could be heard occasionally. Plants were set out at a local nursery, but no people browsed. A few blocks from the dance studio, the American flag of First United Methodist Church was at half-mast. In the words of two different pastors, Dadeville is “somber.”

Rep. Ed Oliver, R-Dadeville, who represents the area in the Legislature, said in an interview that the tragedy was “not something we could even imagine here.”

“Dadeville is a quiet town where people love and respect each other,” he said. “As this investigation continues, we will address the facts. I still believe Dadeville is a great place to live and I look forward to addressing the cause of this horrific event. For now, we just ask people to continue to pray for the victims and their families.”

Tallapoosa County Schools Superintendent Raymond C. Porter said at the Sunday morning press conference that schools would offer counseling on Monday morning, and said the shooting “does not represent our children.”

Gun deaths

Alabama has one of the highest rates of deaths from firearms in the country, behind only Mississippi, Louisiana, Wyoming and Missouri, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

According to Gun Violence Archives, a nonprofit organization that tracks gun violence through police statements and media reports, there have been over 100 mass shootings in Alabama in the last 10 years, resulting in 118 deaths and 443 injuries. The organization defines a mass shooting as one in which four or more people were killed or injured, not including the shooter.

The website said there were 16 mass shootings in Alabama last year, killing 11 people and injuring 69. In 2021, there were 23 mass shootings in the state, killing 22 people and leaving 85 Alabamians injured.

Guns have been the leading cause of death for American children since 2017, according to a 2022 study of CDC data.

According to an April 2023?analysis from Pew Research Center of annual mortality statistics from the CDC, the rise in gun deaths among children coincided with a surge in gun sales and ownership in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The number of gun deaths among children in the United States increased by 50% in just two years. The study found that 1,680 children under the age of 18 died from firearm injuries in 2021, compared to 1,120 in 2019. Most of these deaths were classified as homicides or suicides.

Grief and shock

A vigil held at First Baptist Church, just a few blocks away from where police were still blocking the street, drew a large crowd Sunday evening. People from all ages were grieving, but the children crying stood out.

Hayes started by praying for the students. He asked everyone to find a student and put their hands on them.

“We don’t grieve as those who have no hope. We grieve. We shed tears. Our hearts are broken. We have the hope that the creator of heaven and earth is right here with us,” Hayes prayed.

Hayes also highlighted the teachers in the crowd.

“I want to ask you, once again, gather around these heroes, because there are going to be back in the classroom tomorrow, and they are going to be dealing with these kids, and their broken hearts, and the trauma,” Hayes said.

Pastors from congregations in Dadeville each led a subsequent prayer. Fred Hutcherson, pastor of Zion Hill Baptist Church, prayed for the teachers.

“Lord, as they sit aside whatever’s going on in their lives, to prepare for loving these children tomorrow – Lord – that you give them the strength and the words to say to comfort these students as they try to figure out why things like this might happen,” Hutcherson said.

Antojuan Woody, an 18-year-old student at Dadeville High School, said that he’s still in shock, and can’t believe that it happened still.

“I’m not ready to go back to school,” he said. “With them not being in, it’s going to be terrible.”

Jennifer Ray, mother of 17-year-old Jaiduyen Gossitt, said that as a mother of a Dadeville High School student, she feels broken.

“It could have been her,” Ray said.

Gossitt, who said she was close to one of the victims, said that the community needs to love on each other to move on from this.

Ray said that she’s not sending Gossitt back to school yet.

“She needs time,” Ray said.

This story has been updated with new information.

Louisville hosted a community vigil two days after the shooting at a downtown bank that left six people, including, the shooter dead, and a police officer in critical condition. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Abbey Cutrer)

As Louisville’s mayor and Democratic legislators have pleaded for gun reforms, Republican leaders in the GOP-dominated Kentucky legislature have remained silent on what, if any, actions addressing gun violence they’ll consider following a mass shooting Monday at a downtown Louisville bank.

Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg has been forceful in his calls to action, pointing to specific reforms he says need urgent addressing: giving cities in Kentucky more power to create local gun regulations and changing a decades-old state law that requires guns confiscated by law enforcement — including the AR-15 used in the Louisville mass shooting, according to Greenberg — to be sold at public auction.?

“I’m just hopeful that in the aftermath of this tragedy, which is now directly impacting so many people in our city, that elected officials are ready to take action,” Greenberg said on “Meet The Press” this week. “If they are not going to take action to save lives, to prevent tragedies, why be in office?”?

Bills sponsored by Democratic state lawmakers in recent years to enact both proposals have died without committee hearings, as the GOP-controlled legislature has instead loosened state gun regulations in recent years.

Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear has said Greenberg’s proposal to allow more local control on guns needs to be at least heard in the wake of the shooting.?

Beshear is also calling for a “red flag” law, which generally would allow law enforcement to ask a judge to temporarily remove guns from individuals deemed to be a risk to themselves and others.

Republican Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee is also calling for such a law to separate “dangerous people from firearms”?after a school shooting in Nashville last month. Lee also signed an executive order strengthening background checks on gun buyers.?

Spokespeople for GOP leadership in Kentucky’s legislature did not respond to or answer questions about whether their caucuses would be reconsidering proposals for a “red flag” law, allowing for more local regulation of guns or for changing what happens to guns confiscated by law enforcement. ?

It would be difficult for GOP lawmakers to confront gun lobbyists and pass gun reforms, said a Republican former state senator who supported a “red flag” law. Paul Hornback of Shelbyville said he was attacked by the National Rifle Association for supporting the proposal at the time and that Republicans need the “backbone to stand up to the NRA” to pass such a bill.?

Since six people, including the 25-year-old gunman, were killed at a downtown Louisville bank Monday, community members have outpoured their grief, frustration and anger in the wake of the 146th mass shooting in the United States so far this year.?

A call for local gun laws

In a press conference this week, Greenberg singled out a?state prohibition on local governments enacting regulations on guns and ammo.

“Let us, the people of Louisville, make our own choices about how we reduce gun violence in our city,” Greenberg said to reporters. “Other communities should be able to make the policies that work for them. Let us implement policies that work for us.”?

Rep. Josie Raymond, D-Louisville, has sponsored legislation the past two years that would allow for just that, and it’s a proposal she says had been sponsored in past years by other Democrats. She said she took on the bill after the homicide of Tyree Smith, a Louisville teenager who was killed at a school bus stop in 2021.?

“I think Louisville has unique challenges, and I think Louisville needs unique tools,” Raymond said. “This is something we’ve seen across the country when cities say, ‘We’re facing the challenge of gun violence. How can we take action at the local level?’”?

According to Giffords, a research group that advocates for various gun control measures, at least eight states have enacted laws that allow local governments some flexibility with regulating firearms.

Raymond specifically pointed to the city of Boulder, Colorado, which last year passed local measures to ban the sale and purchase of assault weapons, create a 10-day waiting period to deliver a purchased gun from a licensed firearm dealer and prohibit firearms in public areas such as parks and government buildings.?

But she said she remained pessimistic the bill would gain traction with Republicans in the future. House Bill 34, the latest version of a bill allowing local gun regulations, did not get assigned to a House committee.?

She said guns are “the single most divisive issue between Democrats and Republicans in Frankfort right now.”

“We’re moving backwards in terms of gun legislation.”?

She mentioned previous laws passed by the Republican-dominated legislature related to gun violence and firearms laws, since a 2018 school shooting in Marshall County, including permitless concealed carry of firearms and prohibiting local authorities from enforcing any “federal ban” related to firearms.?

A call for destroying confiscated weapons?

Greenberg also called on lawmakers to allow law enforcement to be able to destroy firearms used in violent crimes. State law currently requires?firearms confiscated by law enforcement to be sold at auction by the Kentucky State Police, with most of the proceeds going to local law enforcement to buy body armor, firearms and more for agencies. Greenberg has called the law “absurd” and “dangerous,” saying the murder weapon from the downtown Louisville shooting could end up being resold eventually.?

Sen. Karen Berg, D-Louisville, has carried a bill since she became a lawmaker in 2020 that would require any confiscated weapons to be destroyed instead of sold. Her latest bill, Senate Bill 168, did not get a committee hearing.?

“I refile it every year, and I talked to people in the Senate about it every year, hoping that slowly or one day, maybe God will listen,” Berg said.?

Berg characterized the legislation as “the lowest hanging fruit” because it doesn’t involve regulating someone’s access to guns, instead only changing the process of what happens to firearms confiscated by law enforcement.?

Berg said Democrats had originally passed the bill in the 1990s when they still controlled the state legislature. The original requirement to sell confiscated guns was created through an amendment by former Rep. Bob Damron of Nicholasville, who was a Democrat when the bill was passed in 1998. An omnibus crime bill that had Damron’s amendment tacked on passed the House and Senate by nearly unanimous votes, with Democrats controlling each chamber.?

Damron, who switched his political party affiliation to Republican after he left the legislature in 2014, said he still supported the law after the Louisville shooting. He said the benefits it provides through extra resources for law enforcement, particularly in poorer counties, is worthwhile.?

“They don’t have any other way to provide that kind of money,” Damron said. “I think it’s great service to the commonwealth and to police officers across the state.”

When asked about Greenberg’s call to change the law, he said it was an “emotional reaction” to blame guns as the problem.

“I feel for the families of those who’ve lost loved ones … but I feel for that loss of all the other people that have died through acts of criminal activity,” Damron said. “That’s just politicization of a tragedy.”?

Berg said it was “disingenuous” for someone to accuse Louisville leaders of politicizing the mass shooting.?

“This has been happening and happening and happening and happening,” Berg said. “If not now, when? When is the right time?”

A 2021 investigation by the Louisville Courier Journal found the state has given more than 300 grants over several years from the auction program totaling almost $2.8 million to police departments, county sheriff’s offices, jails and university and school police agencies. The original 1998 law, according to the newspaper, drew criticism from some local prosecutors and law enforcement leadership in Louisville and Lexington.?

Beshear renews call for a ‘red flag’ law?

Beshear has for years called for Kentucky to enact what is known as a “red flag” law, which broadly allows law enforcement to ask a judge to temporarily remove guns from individuals deemed to be a risk to themselves and others.?

At least 19 states have such laws including nearby Indiana, and advocates for such laws say the provisions prevent gun deaths in situations involving mental health crises and domestic violence, particularly in lowering the rate of gun suicides. The Associated Press reported last year states with “red flag” laws rarely implemented them, blamed in part by a lack of awareness of such laws and resistance to the laws by some authorities.?

“At least it lets us stop that next individual – at least when we know – before they murder people,” Beshear said to CNN this week. “And, listen, I know people will say that wouldn’t have stopped this situation. And it probably wouldn’t have. Maybe it will the next one. I don’t want another family to go through this.”

Lee, the Republican governor of Tennessee, has faced pushback recently from gun lobbyists for urging his GOP colleagues to pass a “red flag” law following a school shooting last month in Nashville.?

Hornback, the former state senator, part of a bipartisan group of lawmakers who unsuccessfully supported a “red flag” law in the past, said the proposal would face an uphill battle against gun lobbyists.?

Hornback, who left office in 2022, said many of his former Republican legislative colleagues privately admit that a “red flag” law could help with mass shootings and gun suicides.?

“They’re all afraid to say anything,” Hornback said. “So many elected officials anymore just want to be reelected. That’s what they want more than anything. So they don’t want to stir anything up. They don’t want to be controversial.”?

“I sincerely hope that after this happening closer to home, that they do realize that they can do something, however minor,” Hornback said.?

People hug at the community vigil honoring victims of the Louisville mass shooting on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, at the Muhammad Ali Center plaza.(Kentucky Lantern photo by Abbey Cutrer)

For help coping with Louisville’s mass shooting, call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 988 or the Disaster Distress Hotline at 1-800-985-5990.

LOUISVILLE – Hundreds filled the Muhammad Ali Center plaza steps Wednesday to mourn those lost in a mass shooting this week.?

Some held signs calling for stricter gun laws, others sat in the sunny plaza with panting therapy dogs.?

Cocoa was one of the canines who came out to help people heal. For her first big event, she came out with her handler, Renny Smith, to help comfort Louisvillians.?

She rested near the steps while people came up to pat her head or stroke her dark fur.?

“A lot of times, people won’t say that they actually are hurting,” Smith said. “But they’ll pet the dog.”?

Politicians and faith leaders spoke to the crowd during the hour-long vigil. They called for gun reform and unity, among other things.?

The vigil came after?a gunman killed five people and injured others at Old National Bank in downtown Louisville, where he worked, on Monday morning.?

Those killed are Joshua Barrick, Thomas Elliott, Juliana Farmer, James Tutt and Deana Eckert.?

Rabbi Beth Jacowitz-Chottiner with Louisville’s Temple Shalom said it is time to “ban assault weapons that were created only for battlefields.”

Cheers and claps broke her sentence in half.?

Whitney Austin, who survived being shot 12 times at Fifth Third Bank in Cincinnati in 2018, also addressed the crowd — through tears, at one point.?

“Please don’t forget about them next week,” she said of Monday’s victims. “Don’t forget about them next month and don’t forget about them next year. They’re going to need your support for the rest of their lives.”?

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg, state Sen. Gerald Neal and U.S. Rep. Morgan McGarvey also spoke.

“While I’m not angry, I’m empty and I’m sad,” said Beshear, who was friends with Elliott and others involved.?His voice broke as he spoke. “I just keep thinking that maybe we’ll wake up.”

Greenberg called on the community to support the survivors who will now live with “physical and mental wounds that will take time to heal.”

“It’s important that we take time to acknowledge those losses, and what they mean for us as people and as a community,” he said. We have to do that so that later, we can gather our energies and focus on preventing these tragedies.”

Dr. Muhammad Babar of Louisville implored lawmakers at the state and federal level to “please, please, please, do something” about gun violence.?

“I’m really fatigued and frustrated on this nonstop vicious cycle of deadly shootings in our nation. I’m dead tired of posting hollow words and prayers on … social media after each incident of mass shooting.”?

Old National Bank CEO Jim Ryan said “there are no adequate words” to describe the pain employees of the bank feel right now, as well as the victims’ families.

“The greatest way we can continue to honor everyone who has been impacted by this tragedy is our do our best to follow their example,” he said. “We need to love one another. We need to care for one another. And we need to support one another.”

Cathy Mekus, who co-leads the Kentucky chapter of Moms Demand Action, told the Kentucky Lantern that now is the time both to grieve and fight.?

“We need to mourn, we need to care for the people who’ve been hurt,” she said.?“We can’t find a window between mass shootings, when we could just stand back and mourn…we need to do both at the same time.”?

Three still hospitalized?

In addition to those killed Monday, three people injured remain hospitalized.?

One of those, Louisville police officer Nickolas Wilt, is still in critical condition.

Wilt was working only his fourth shift as a member of the force when dispatched to Monday’s shooting. He was shot in the head as he “ran towards the gunfire,” LMPD said.?

After the shooting, nine people went to UofL Hospital for emergency treatment. Six of those have since gone home. One died and one remains at the hospital in stable condition.?

UofL Health and American Red Cross officials have asked people to donate blood after UofL staff needed to use 170 units to save patients from the scene.?

Mekus said she wants to see the gun used in Monday’s shooting destroyed.?

“I’m afraid it’s going to end up being someone’s gruesome souvenir,” she said. “And I just don’t want that to happen.”?

As the vigil ended around 6 p.m., singer Jason Clayborn led the crowd in Amazing Grace.?

Image from body camera worn by officers approaching scene of mass shooting. (Screenshot)

Louisville police on Tuesday afternoon released footage from body cameras worn by the two officers who arrived first at a mass shooting scene and who were both wounded by the gunman.?

Rookie Officer Nickolas Wilt, who was shot in the head, is in critical condition.?

After Wilt was hit while approaching the building, his training officer, Cory Galloway, who was grazed by a bullet, briefly took cover behind a concrete planter before shooting and killing the gunman.

Wilt was rescued by officers and transported in a police car to the University of Louisville hospital, said Deputy Chief Paul Humphrey, who narrated the video.?

Humphrey said officers could not see the shooter as they approached from the street but he could see them from inside the foyer of the building in the 300 block of Main Street that houses Old National Bank. The shooter was an employee of the bank.

Humphrey said that after attacking his coworkers with an AR-15 rifle, the shooter set up an “ambush” and lay in wait in the lobby for police.?

Five victims have died; three remained hospitalized yesterday.

Humphrey explained it was impossible for officers to see the shooter as they approached because of the building’s elevation above street level, two sets of doors and and type of glass.

Humphrey praised Wilt and Galloway for staying in the line of fire. “There’s only a few people in this country who can do what they did, not everybody can do that.” And he praised all the first responders who “go in before we can say it’s safe.”?

He said Wilt’s and Galloway’s quick response and the actions of other officers who provided medical treatment saved lives.??

He also called for extending care and compassion to the families of the victims and also to officers who are physically and emotionally hurting.

“The most heroic things at the peak of our career that we do are shrouded in other people’s tragedies.”

Police also released video taken by a bystander from across the street. ?None of the footage played during a news briefing shows victims or beyond the bank’s lobby and its shattered glass.

Humphrey said the video and officer personnel files would be posted on Louisville Metro Police Department social media accounts.

Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg briefs media about a mass shooting at the Old National Bank, April 10, 2023, Louisville. (Kentucky Lantern photo by McKenna Horsley)

LOUISVILLE — Louisville’s mayor and congressman and a physician treating victims of a mass shooting pleaded Tuesday for action on gun violence.

The day after a gunman killed five people in a downtown bank, Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg called on state lawmakers to let the city make its own policy choices about reducing gun violence.?

Kentucky law prohibits local governments from enacting regulations on guns or ammunition.

The mayor said that if lawmakers truly care about police like Officer Nickolas Wilt, who was in critical condition at a Louisville hospital after taking an AR-15 bullet to his head, or Officer Cory Galloway, the officer who shot the gunman, they should allow the city to deal with “our unique gun violence epidemic.”?

“Let us, the people of Louisville, make our own choices about how we reduce gun violence in our city,” Greenberg said. “Other communities should be able to make the policies that work for them. Let us implement policies that work for us.”?

The mayor added that illegal guns and gun violence in the city is “killing far too many people in mass shootings and individual shootings in any shooting.” After Monday’s shooting, 40 people have died in Louisville this year from gunshots, he said.?

According to the Gun Violence Archive, a non-profit organization that collects data on American mass shootings, the Louisville shooting was the nation’s 146th mass shooting of 2023 and its 14th mass murder.

Greenberg called for “short-term action” to prevent further tragedies.?

“Let me be clear, I don’t care about finger pointing. I don’t care about blame. I don’t care about politics,” the mayor said. “I’m only interested in working together with our state legislators to take meaningful action to save lives, to prevent more tragic injuries and more death. Arguing is not a strategy. Doing nothing is not a strategy. It’s not a solution.”

He noted that many may not think something like this could happen to them until it does. Last year, Greenberg survived a workplace shooting. On Tuesday, he said he knew Deana Eckert, one of the five victims from Monday.?

“It has happened in Louisville. It could happen in Paducah, in Pikeville or in Covington. This is happening in America everywhere and will keep happening until we say enough and take meaningful action.

Greenberg said Kentucky’s current law allows the murder weapon to be sold again in an auction. In February, his administration directed LMPD to remove firing pins from seized weapons bound for auction.?

During a Tuesday morning press conference, the major was joined by Democratic Kentucky Congressman Morgan McGarvey, who said he had spoken with federal and state officials about sending federal resources to Louisville, such as additional counseling services.?

“We need to take this grief and turn it into action,” McGarvey said.?

Last week, McGarvey had called members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus together for a special order hour on increased gun violence in America’s communities. In special orders, congress members can make speeches about different topics.?

McGarvey said that he worked with conservative colleagues while in the Kentucky legislature to introduce crisis aversion rights retention laws.?

“Please if you are a person of faith, and you want to give us your thoughts and your prayers, we want them and we need them,” McGarvey said.” Our community is hurting but we need policies in place that will keep this from happening again so the thoughts and prayers do not have to be offered to yet another community ripped apart by the savage violence coming from guns.”

University of Louisville Health Chief Medical Officer Dr. Jason Smith told reporters Tuesday that he’s worked at the university hospital for 15 years treating people with gunshot wounds.

“There’s only so many times you can walk into a room and tell someone they’re not coming home tomorrow and it just breaks your heart,” Smith said. “When you hear someone screaming, ‘Mommy,’ or ‘Daddy,’ It just becomes too hard day in and day out to be able to do that.”

While he is a doctor and doesn’t work in policy, Smith asked federal and state lawmakers to “do something because doing nothing, which is what we’ve been doing, is not working.”?

“We have to do something because this is just getting out of hand across our city and across this great nation of ours,” he continued.?

In response to a reporter’s question, Greenberg said he was not calling for a special session of Kentucky’s General Assembly but rather wanted to work on a plan that could be implemented quickly.?

Rep. Daniel Grossberg, D-Louisville, said in a Monday tweet that he would favor a special session for “commonsense gun reform.”?

Kentucky House Democratic Caucus Leaders Reps. Derrick Graham, Cherlynn Stevenson and Rachel Roberts called for more legislative action in a Monday statement, saying “we should not have to live like this – living in fear and in a time where legislative inaction regarding gun violence has become the law of the land. We must demand more.”

Louisville’s Democratic Delegation in the General Assembly said in a Monday statement that the city “experienced a devastating loss of life to senseless gun violence” but “we cannot allow it to become normalized.” The delegation vowed to bring communities together in the coming weeks and months to discuss “commonsense policies that would save lives.”

“As legislators, we owe it to the people in our districts to have real conversations about what each of us will do differently to stop these preventable deaths in our communities,” the statement said. “What happened today was a symptom of a much larger epidemic. And while we know that this is a moment when our community needs to come together and heal, we also know that this does not have to be our reality moving forward.”

Republican leadership in both the Kentucky House of Representatives and the Senate released Monday statements about the shooting.?

“This morning’s attacks in Louisville are heartbreaking as lives are shattered by a senseless act of violence,” said Republican House Speaker David Osborne. “We mourn the loss of innocent life and hold those wounded in prayer as we do the families of both. As details continue to unfold, we also offer our appreciation to the men and women of the Louisville Metro Police Department for their response surely saved countless other lives.”

“After another senseless act of violence, the Senate stands firmly with the City of Louisville,” said Republican Senate President Robert Stivers. “During this tragic time, we will hold the victims’ loved ones and friends in our prayers. I commend law enforcement who rushed to the scene, placed themselves in the line of fire to protect the public, and ended an obviously deranged individual’s shooting spree. If not for these heroes, even more families and friends would be mourning today.”

Sign in NuLu neighborhood near the scene of the shooting. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Liam Niemeyer)

LOUISVILLE — Louisville will have the chance to gather for a community vigil at the Muhammad Ali Center Wednesday and grieve following a mass shooting Monday.

Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg said the vigil is a chance “to help the people of our community, of our great city come together and deal with this outbreak of tragedies – to grieve, to pray, to unite.”

The announcement came after police say a gunman killed five people and injured others at his place of employment, Old National Bank in downtown Louisville, on Monday morning. Four people are still hospitalized after being injured in the shooting.

“This vigil will be to acknowledge the wounds, physical and emotional, that gun violence leaves behind,” said Greenberg. “It will be an interfaith opportunity for our entire community to come together to grieve, to heal, to begin to move forward.”

Additionally, the city will make available grief counselors and mental health professionals through its Office for Safe and Healthy Neighborhoods.

A list of locations where people can go to talk to those counselors will be published Tuesday afternoon, Greenberg said, at www.louisvilleky.gov/government/safe-neighborhoods.

You can also call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 988 or the Disaster Distress Hotline at 1-800-985-5990.

Information about community vigil

• Who: Everyone is welcome to attend this community vigil .
• What: A community vigil to mourn the lives lost in Louisville’s mass shooting Monday
• When: 5 p.m. Wednesday, April 12.
• Where: the Muhammad Ali Center plaza, located at 144 N. 6th Street in Louisville
• Why: The vigil is a chance to process Monday’s events as a community.
• How do I park? Free parking will be available at the event.

UofL Health chief medical officer Dr. Jason Smith. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Sarah Ladd)

LOUISVILLE — While treating Louisville’s mass shooting victims, UofL Health staff used 170 units of blood, chief medical officer Dr. Jason Smith said Tuesday.

That comes out to more than 80 donations.?

The blood needed “far outstrips our hospital capacity,” Smith said at an 11:30 media briefing at Louisville Metro Hall.

Kentucky’s chapter of the American Red Cross came to the rescue.?

“Their ability to get us that blood,” Smith said, “helped save lives.”?

Now, the city needs people in the community to donate more.?

O Negative is the go-to blood type and most in demand right now, according to Kentucky Red Cross Chief Executive Officer Steve Cunanan.?

“That is what the emergency room personnel use and what they reach for when..they don’t have time to determine a blood type,” Cunanan said.?

Johns Hopkins reported in 208 that people who are shot need 10 times more blood during transfusions than people injured other ways – like car wrecks or stabbings.?

Three still hospitalized?

UofL Health still has three people hospitalized from the event at Old National Bank that left five dead plus the shooter, whom police say they killed.?

The hospital system reported Tuesday afternoon that a fifth patient was discharged. One person who went to the hospital has died.?

Two of the hospitalized patients are stable and in fair condition, UofL said. One, Louisville Metro Police Officer Nikolas Wilt, is in critical condition.?

The recently sworn-in officer was working his fourth shift when Monday’s shooting happened. He was shot in the head as he “ran towards the gunfire,” LMPD said.?

Caring for multiple shooting victims “is not an infrequent day for us” for Smith and his team, he said. “The events surrounding this made this obviously much more difficult. But to be honest with you, we barely had to adjust our operating room schedule to be able to do this. That’s how frequently we are having to deal with gun violence in our community.”?

Already in 2023, Mayor Craig Greenberg said, 40 people have been shot to death in Kentucky’s largest city.?

How to donate blood

“There are always other patients,” Smith said. “Donating blood now helps us in the future. The lives that were saved yesterday were because of the American Red Cross and the blood they had on the shelves.”?

Follow these links to make an appointment to give blood near your ZIP code:?

• https://www.redcrossblood.org/give.html/drive-results?zipSponsor=40203?
• https://my.kybloodcenter.org/donor/schedules/geo?

This story may be updated.?

Louisville Metro Police Department Interim Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel briefs reporters on Tuesday. (Kentucky Lantern photo by McKenna Horsley)

LOUISVILLE —?The AR-15 rifle used to kill five people in Louisville was purchased legally, police said Tuesday.?

In a morning news conference, Louisville Metro Police Department officials said the gunman bought an AR-15 rifle on April 4 from a Louisville gun dealer — six days before he walked into his place of employment and killed his coworkers.?

Five victims died from the shooting at Old National Bank, LMPD has said. According to their LinkedIn profiles, they were all employees of the bank. They are:?

• 40-year-old Joshua Barrick, senior vice president of Commercial Real Estate Banking
• 57-year-old Deana Eckert, executive administrative officer
• 63-year-old Thomas Elliott, senior vice president
• 45-year-old Juliana Farmer, loan analyst
• 64-year-old Jim Tutt, market executive

Nine people were injured and taken to the University of Louisville hospital for treatment.?Eckert was among those being treated for injuries but died Monday night at the hospital.

Four patients were still in the hospital Tuesday morning. One was in critical condition and three were stable at that time. Officer Nickolas Wilt was in critical condition Monday night after receiving a gunshot wound to the head. On Tuesday morning, his condition remains the same.?

The gunman, identified as 25-year-old Connor Sturgeon, was an employee of Old National Bank and died from police gunfire. Officer Cory Galloway shot Sturgeon.

Wilt was sworn into the police force in late March. Galloway is his field training officer.

A motive for the shooting is unclear but Louisville Interim Police Chief? Jacquelyn? Gwinn-Villaroel said it was “targeted.”?

“He knew those individuals, of course, because he worked there,” she said.?

Police investigations are continuing.?

“We have executed a search warrant on his residence and we have recovered items and we cannot get into specific details on what we recover at this time, because again, the investigation is ongoing and we want to make sure that we’re providing accurate information,” Interim Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel. ?“The family deserves that and the community deserves that.”

Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg said Kentucky’s current law paves the way for the murder weapon to be sold again in an auction, as all weapons seized by police must be sold in auction if not retained for official use. In February, his administration directed LMPD to remove firing pins from seized weapons bound for auction.?

“That’s not enough. It’s time to change this law. And let us destroy illegal guns and destroy the guns that have been used to kill our friends and kill our neighbors,” Greenberg said.

On Monday, a mass shooting occurred in downtown Louisville. Louisville Metro Police received initial reports around 8:30 a.m. and responded within three minutes.?

According to the Gun Violence Archive, a non-profit organization that collects data on American mass shootings, the Louisville shooting was the nation’s 146th mass shooting of 2023 and its 14th mass murder.

Posted in the Nulu neighborhood of Louisville after a shooter who had legally purchased an assault weapon killed five people on April 10, 2023. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Liam Niemeyer)

LOUISVILLE — Just three blocks from where a lone gunman opened fire killing five people, the Rev. Dale Raines kept the large red doors of St. John United Church of Christ open to the blue sky and spring blooms as he changed the Easter greeting on the church’s sign to a more timely message.

?“WE WEEP WE PRAY WE MUST CHANGE.”?

Raines hoped the open church would provide a quiet space for whomever needed it in the Nulu neighborhood of Louisville to grieve and mourn.?

The church’s new message reflected Raines’ emotions: “I feel that grief, but also yeah, a very high level of frustration and anger,” Raines said. “We shouldn’t have to live like this. We shouldn’t have to die like this.”

Little foot traffic was on the street. The neighborhood has become host to various eclectic, affluent shops and bars near Slugger Field, the minor league baseball team’s stadium, located next to Old National Bank, where the mass shooting took place. Some businesses along his street tend to close on Mondays, Raines said, but others had also closed down due to the shooting.?

It’s a place where tourists from out of town visit in Kentucky’s largest city, he said. It’s a place that now saw one of the worst incidents of gun violence in the city’s history.?

“Let’s be honest: these things are happening everywhere, which is part of the grief, and the frustration, and quite frankly the anger that I feel that we are the problem,” Raines said. “We keep putting people in elected offices that refuse to do anything to change the situation. And people keep dying.”

Raines’ grief and anger were echoed by other Louisvillians near where the shooting took place, devastated by the news of the deaths, angered at the perceived lack of action on gun violence and overwhelmed with the enormity of the problem.?

“I just don’t understand why this type of stuff is going on, and so much of it going on. It’s just getting so close to home,” said Eric Fuqua, a construction worker in Nulu from West Louisville. “They’re going to have to do something about something I would think.”?

Fuqua said he’s unsure what can ultimately be done about mass shootings, mentioning how politicians often “claim they have the answer to our problems.”?

“But it doesn’t seem like it’s working to me.”?

Across the street from the church in Nulu, 24-year-old Ryan Petiprin helps manage a shop and got a message from his boss asking if he wanted to come in, saying a lot of the stores in the area were closed.?

“It was definitely very nerve wracking,” Petiprin said. “Very disheartening for Louisville going in the future.”?

Petiprin sees what has happened recently in Tennessee following protests calling for gun control measures — including two Democratic Tennessee lawmakers expelled from the state legislature — and worries what would happen in Kentucky.?

?“If you look at what’s going on in Tennessee, like that can’t happen here,” he said. “That’s really awful, and it sets a bad precedent. So I think that complete gun reform should happen.”

Joe Spencer, a member of Louisville’s Complete Streets Coalition, walking through Nulu has a more direct opinion on the cause of mass shootings: the access to guns, particularly high-powered firearms.?

“It’s just a sad day.” Spencer said. “As long as there’s more guns, there’s going to be more of this sort of thing.”

The stark divide over how to address mass shootings and gun violence, seen sharply in the Kentucky legislature, could even be heard on a bench by the downtown waterfront park along the Ohio River.?

“Gun control is not the answer. I don’t know if the guy had mental issues or whatever that they could track, but I don’t think gun control is it — it’s just damn people,” said Lamont Tarrence, sitting next to her cousin, Tina Turner.?

The park with large green lawns and a walking bridge to southern Indiana adjoins the baseball stadium.

“I disagree with that. I think it is gun control. I think guns are ending up in the wrong people’s hands,” Turner said. “I think it needs to be some type of implementation on who has a gun, how they’re getting them, how they’re obtaining these guns.”?

Both of them agreed the news of the shooting had them distraught.?

“I thought it was only a matter of time until it’s Louisville’s turn,” Tarrence said. “I hate to say this — it’s the days that we live in now.”?

Meka Brown, who just moved to Louisville, thought of her young daughter when the news of the shooting broke. Her daughter ran around the playground at the waterfront park, wearing a t-shirt with the rapper Notorious B.I.G. on the front.

“You understand how serious it is because you see the real time ramifications for those type of situations,” Brown said. “I don’t want this to be her reality nor mine. My hope is that it doesn’t have to get any more serious than it already is.”

First responders gathered the morning of April 10 in downtown Louisville near the scene of a mass shooting at Old National Bank near Slugger Field. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Liam Niemeyer)

The Louisville Metro Police Department on social media announced Monday evening a sixth person has died following a mass shooting at a downtown Louisville bank.?

A tweet from LMPD announced the death of 57-year-old Deana Eckert, who joins four other victims who died from the mass shooting. Law enforcement killed the lone gunman Monday morning.?

According to a professional social media profile, Eckert served as an executive administrative officer at Old National Bank.?

“As this difficult day comes to an end, I’m sad to say that we have lost another life to today’s horrific shooting,” said Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg in a tweet. “Please join Rachel and me in praying for peace and comfort for her and her family.”

Gov. Andy Beshear in a tweet said his “heart breaks for these families, Louisville and our entire commonwealth.”

First responders gathered the morning of April 10 in downtown Louisville near the scene of a mass shooting at Old National Bank near Slugger Field. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Liam Niemeyer)

LOUISVILLE —?After news of a shooting in downtown Louisville broke Monday, Kentucky politicians quickly reacted to share their thoughts.?

Some called for thoughts and prayers for victims, their families and others responding to the incidents, while others made pleas for more gun control laws.?

Five people died, including the shooter, during the shooting at Old National Bank. Nine were taken to the University of Louisville hospital to be treated for injuries.

Late Monday, the Democrats who represent Louisville in the Kentucky legislature called for “real change” and promised to bring “communities together to talk about commonsense policies that would save lives.” Here is their statement:

“This morning, our city experienced a devastating loss of life to senseless gun violence. We hold the grieving families in our hearts, along with the brave first responders who put their lives on the line today and every day.?Losing mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, to gun violence has become commonplace everywhere in our nation, but we cannot allow it to become normalized.?This is not a tragedy that happened just to Louisville. These tragedies are happening everywhere in Kentucky, every single day and in every single county.

“As legislators, we owe it to the people in our districts to have real conversations about what each of us will do differently to stop these preventable deaths in our communities.?What happened today was a symptom of a much larger epidemic. And while we know that this is a moment when our community needs to come together and heal, we also know that this does not have to be our reality moving forward.?Over the coming weeks and months, we will be bringing communities together to talk about commonsense policies that would save lives. We will build a platform for real change for every Kentuckian. We commit to working with anyone who is willing to work in the best interests of the people of Kentucky.

“We will not forget the profound loss of this day, and we call on our constituents and our colleagues to help us end this scourge in our Commonwealth.”

Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear traveled to the city Monday morning.?

https://twitter.com/GovAndyBeshear/status/1645469395185958923?s=20

Others seeking to become Kentucky’s next governor also released statements.?

https://twitter.com/kyoag/status/1645487181333495808?s=20

https://twitter.com/RyanQuarlesKY/status/1645433818944249858?s=20

https://twitter.com/KellyCraftKY/status/1645440728326103045?s=20

https://twitter.com/KeckForKY/status/1645458644316585985?s=20

State lawmakers who represent Louisville also commented on the incidents.

https://twitter.com/KeturahHerron/status/1645432616043139075?s=20

https://twitter.com/grossberg4ky/status/1645514998335021057?s=20

https://twitter.com/PamForAG/status/1645465913771139073?s=20

https://twitter.com/DavidYatesKY37/status/1645467185643507712?s=20

https://twitter.com/KYSenateDems/status/1645457788825419779?s=20

Leadership in both the Kentucky House of Representatives and Senate commented on the Louisville shootings.

“This morning’s attacks in Louisville are heartbreaking as lives are shattered by a senseless act of violence,” said Republican House Speaker David Osborne. “We mourn the loss of innocent life and hold those wounded in prayer as we do the families of both. As details continue to unfold, we also offer our appreciation to the men and women of the Louisville Metro Police Department for their response surely saved countless other lives.”

“After another senseless act of violence, the Senate stands firmly with the City of Louisville,” said Republican Senate President Robert Stivers. “During this tragic time, we will hold the victims’ loved ones and friends in our prayers. I commend law enforcement who rushed to the scene, placed themselves in the line of fire to protect the public, and ended an obviously deranged individual’s shooting spree. If not for these heroes, even more families and friends would be mourning today.”

Kentucky House Democratic Caucus Leaders Reps. Derrick Graham, Cherlynn Stevenson and Rachel Roberts said the following: ““We are beyond devastated by what happened in Louisville this morning as we and our nation endure not one but two shooting sprees in a span of hours.? We mourn for the victims who were senselessly killed or wounded and pray for them and their loved ones.? We also want to praise the decisive action and bravery of law enforcement that undoubtedly saved lives.? More broadly, though, we should not have to live like this – living in fear and in a time where legislative inaction regarding gun violence has become the law of the land.? We must demand more.”

Members of Kentucky’s congressional delegation also issued statements on Monday.

https://twitter.com/LeaderMcConnell/status/1645442626584297475?s=20

https://twitter.com/RandPaul/status/1645443284486037504?s=20

https://twitter.com/RepMcGarvey/status/1645453289880793091?s=20

President Joe Biden called on Republicans to act. Vice President Kamala Harris also issued a statement.

https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1645469188813619209?s=20

https://twitter.com/VP/status/1645492923650252819?s=20

Both the Republican Party of Kentucky and the Kentucky Democratic Party released statements on social media following Monday’s shootings.

https://twitter.com/KyDems/status/1645477806376091660?s=20

https://twitter.com/KYGOP/status/1645458255357915137?s=20

First responders gathered the morning of April 10 in downtown Louisville near the scene of a mass shooting at Old National Bank near Slugger Field. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Liam Niemeyer)

LOUISVILLE — The next 24 hours will be “critical” for shooting victims who needed surgery after being injured in a Louisville mass shooting Monday, according to UofL Health’s chief medical officer, Dr. Jason Smith.

Of the nine patients sent to UofL Hospital Monday, Smith said, three were in critical condition as of around 3:30 p.m. Monday.

Three have been released, he said, and three are still in the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

“The three that are in critical condition did require operative care from our trauma team and our emergency department services,” Smith said.

His team treated five gunshot wounds from the mass shooting scene, he said.

When Smith spoke Monday afternoon, no one brought into the hospital injured had died.

He praised police and emergency responders, saying “they saved lives today.”

He also thanked the hospital nurses and physicians.

“They were able to care for a large number of people coming in severely injured in a very short period of time,” Smith said. “We were able to get them to the services they need.”

In addition to the nine injured, five were killed in the shooting at Old National Bank, including the shooter, who was a bank employee. Those killed by the shooter are, according to Louisville Police:

• Joshua Barrick, 40

• Thomas Elliot, 63

• Juliana Farmer, 45

• James Tutt, 64

None of the patients who required surgery were awake yet when Smith gave the Monday afternoon update, alongside Gov. Andy Beshear, Mayor Craig Greenberg and Police Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel.

“Really the next 24 hours for all involved in this who required an operation are going to be the critical time period for us to understand really how well they’re going to recover from this acute part of their overall care,” Smith said. “They’ve got long roads ahead of them, but if we can get through 24 hours then we will take another 24 hours and we will keep doing that until they get out of the hospital.”

Gov. Andy Beshear spoke at afternoon briefing. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Liam Niemeyer)

LOUISVILLE — Louisville police on Monday night announced that a sixth person has died as a result of a mass shooting Monday morning at a downtown bank.

Earlier in the day, Louisville Metro Police Department Interim Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel was joined by Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg to name the victims of a mass shooting, one of them a close friend of the governor.?

According to LMPD, the five victims are:?

• 40-year-old Joshua Barrick
• 57-year-old Deana Eckert
• 63-year-old Thomas Elliott
• 45-year-old Juliana Farmer
• 64-year-old James Tutt

Also dead is the shooter, identified by Gwinn-Villaroel as 25-year-old Connor Sturgeon, an employee of Old National Bank where the shooting happened. She said he used a “rifle” in the shooting, he was livestreaming on social media and that police officers killed him.?

“The evil that took place today, we shouldn’t hear the tears that were coming out from these families,” Gwinn-Villaroel said. “That right there sticks, because they are weeping because someone decided that they wanted to take life today.”

Beshear, his voice choking at times, said Thomas Elliott was a close friend of his who helped the governor start his law career, helped with his gubernatorial campaign and offered advice on how to be a good father.?

“These are irreplaceable, amazing individuals that a terrible act of violence tore from all of us,” Beshear said. “What we need most right now in a word is love. I mean just love — love for these families. They are going to need it.”?

Beshear said there would be time in the future to “talk about issues” related to gun violence but that the focus should be on the victims and their families.?

Elliott was the senior vice president at Old National Bank, and former Gov. Steve Beshear — the father of current Gov. Andy Beshear — appointed Elliott to the Kentucky Retirement Systems board. Elliott served as chairman of the pension board during the elder Beshear’s administration.?

Eckert, who died Monday night, served as an executive administrative officer at Old National Bank.?

Eight people were injured. During the afternoon news conference, Dr. Jason Smith at the University of Louisville hospital said the surviving victims remained at the hospital, three in critical condition. Gwinn-Villaroel identified the police officer in critical condition at the hospital due to a gunshot wound to the head as Nikolas Wilt, who she said was just sworn into the police force in late March.?

Gatherings for the victims are planned in Louisville Monday evening.?

Earlier in the day, Louisville Metro Police Department Deputy Chief Paul Humphrey said officers arrived at the downtown bank within three minutes of being dispatched after receiving a report of an active shooter at 8:30 a.m. ET and exchanged gunfire with the lone suspect.?

“Ultimately that suspect did die on the scene.”?

He said four of the five dead from the shooting were found deceased inside the bank and that officers are trying to contact families of the victims. Eight injured were taken to the University of Louisville hospital, with two in critical condition.?

One of those in critical condition is a LMPD officer, and another officer had “non-critical injuries.”?

CNN reports the shooter used an AR-15 style weapon, according to a federal law enforcement source.

Humphrey said that there was no active threat and that the investigation into the shooting would take “pretty much into the night.” He said officers believe the lone shooter was a previous employee of the bank but were still trying to establish a connection to the business.?

“We will find ways to love and support one another and the families and friends who have been directly impacted by these acts of gun violence, and we will come together as a community to work to prevent these horrific acts of gun violence from continuing here and around the state,” said Louisivlle Mayor Craig Greenberg.?

Greenberg said that the city is a “stronger community” because of the work of law enforcement and said his prayers go out to the victims and their friends and families.?

Beshear said he had a “close friend” that “didn’t make it” in the shooting and another one who was being treated at the hospital.

“This is awful,” Beshear said. “We’ve got to wrap our arms around these families. And everybody who needs it, don’t be afraid to get some help.”?

This story will be updated.

Rep. George Brown, D-Lexington. (Photo by LRC Public Information)

Kentucky’s Black Legislative Caucus joined the National Black Caucus of State Legislators in? condemning the potential expulsion of? three Tennessee state lawmakers after days of turmoil at the Capitol in Nashville.?

Last week, three Tennessee Democrats?—?Rep. Gloria Johnson, Justin J. Pearson and Justin Jones — led an impromptu protest on the House floor against gun violence in response to the mass shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville. A former student gunned down three nine-year-old children and three adults.?

Republican lawmakers filed resolutions for the trio’s expulsion from the legislature.?

In an email to media members Thursday afternoon, caucus chair, Rep. George Brown, D-Lexington, said Kentucky’s Black caucus endorsed the national organization’s statement. The NBCSL said in its statement that Tennessee House leadership “villainized” the actions of the three legislator and that the national group plans to continue its support for gun reform laws.?

“I am saddened by the potential expulsion of these three legislators for exercising their First Amendment right on the chamber floor,” said Rep. Laura Hall of Alabama and president of NBCSL. “Gun reform continues to be a frontline issue in all states and we must continue to work to pass legislation to reduce the loss of innocent lives.”

The Kentucky group consists of 10 lawmakers from the House of Representatives and Senate. Kentucky’s legislature has 138 members.

After the bills for expulsion were filed, the Tennessee Lookout reported the Tennessee Black Caucus called the move “political retribution” and “morally bankrupt.”?

The expulsion hearings were being held Thursday.

The Covenant School, where seven people, including the shooter, died in a mass shooting in Nashville, Tenn. on Monday March 27, 2023 (Photo by John Partipilo)

Gov. Andy Beshear has directed that flags at state office buildings be lowered to half-staff until sunset on?Friday “in honor and remembrance of the victims of the acts of violence perpetrated on March 27 in Nashville, Tennessee,” according to a release from the governor’s office.

Three children and three adult staff members were killed in the mass shooting Monday at The Covenant School, a private Christian school in Nashville’s Green Hills neighborhood.

Among the victims are three 9-year-old children: Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs, and William Kinney. The adult victims are Cynthia Peak, 61,? Mike Hill, 61, and Katherine Koonce, 60. Police said Peak was a substitute teacher, Hill a custodian and Koonce Covenant’s head of school.

The shooter, identified as 28-year-old Nashville native Audrey Elizabeth Hale, was killed by responding officers, according to police. Hale is believed to be a former student of the school, Nashville Police Chief John Drake said.

Beshear ?encouraged individuals, businesses and organizations throughout the commonwealth to join in this tribute. Flag status information is available at https://governor.ky.gov/flag-status.

The Covenant School, where seven people, including the shooter, died in a mass shooting in Nashville, Tenn. on Monday March 27, 2023 (Photo by John Partipilo)

Three children and three adult staff members are dead after a mass shooting event Monday at The Covenant School, a private Christian school in Nashville’s Green Hills neighborhood.

Among the victims are three 9-year-old children: Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs, and William Kinney. The adult victims are Cynthia Peak, 61,? Mike Hill, 61, and Katherine Koonce, 60. Police said Peak was a substitute teacher, Hill a custodian and Koonce Covenant’s head of school.

The shooter, identified as 28-year-old Nashville native Audrey Elizabeth Hale, was killed by responding officers, according to police. Hale is believed to be a former student of the school, Nashville Police Chief John Drake said. Police said they have found a “manifesto,” a map detailing entry points into the school and other materials. Local and federal law enforcement on Monday afternoon continued a search of the Nashville home Hale shared with parents and also said they have found no prior criminal history.

Drake said Hale may have had plans to target another school.

“It’s a very unfortunate situation,” Drake said of the tragic loss of life. He was moved to tears to see children being ushered out of the building following the shooting, he said. “My heart goes out to the families of all six” victims.

All of the victims’ families have been notified, according to police. Families of students and staff gathered at a nearby church that served as a reunification center.

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden on Monday morning also addressed the tragedy at separate public appearances.

“It’s sick … heartbreaking … a family’s worst nightmare” the president said. He called on Congress to pass an assault weapons ban and urged students and teachers to seek out counseling.

“We stand with Nashville in prayer,” Jill Biden said.

The shooting took place Monday morning inside the school where 209 students and 42 staff are present on a typical day. The school, operated by Covenant Presbyterian Church, is located in one of Nashville’s most affluent neighborhoods.

Nashville Police responded to a report of an active shooter incident made at 10:13 a.m., said Don Aaron, a police department spokesman.

At 10:27 a.m. the shooter was killed by two of a five-member police team that responded, he said.

Aaron said the shooter was armed with at least two assault rifles and a handgun. Hale entered by shooting through a side door at the school and went to the second floor, police said. The shooting took place on the second floor, a “lobby-type area,” not inside a classroom.

Drake said they believe two of the weapons were legally obtained in Nashville.

One officer suffered a hand injury from cut glass, Aaron said. “That is the only other injury I’m aware of,” he added.

Vanderbilt University Medical Center confirmed students from the pre-K-6th grade school on Burton Hills Road were transported to Monroe Carrell Jr. Children’s Hospital, where they were pronounced dead.

The private school had no onsite school resource officer, Aaron said.

The school did have security cameras. “There is video from the school we are viewing now to try and learn exactly how all of this happened,” Aaron said.

Nashville Police plan to release video of officers confronting the shooter.

A nearby vehicle yielded clues to law enforcement about the shooter’s identity, the police chief said.

The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation will handle the officer-involved shooting, while Nashville police will field the larger investigation, law enforcement officials said during a 2 p.m. briefing.

“It’s a horrible, senseless tragedy, and we will be here working with our partners to get through this,” said TBI Director David Rausch.

The Senate and House planned to gavel in Monday evening and then adjourn out of respect for the victims.

Rep. Bob Freeman, D-Nashville, issued a statement on the incident, which took place in his South Nashville statehouse district.

“This is an unimaginable tragedy for the victims, all the children, families, teachers, staff and my entire community,” Freeman said.

“I live around the corner from Covenant and pass by it often. I have friends who attend both church and school there. I have also visited the church in the past. It tears my heart apart to see this. I’m praying for my neighborhood, my city and my state,” he said. “It is time to pull together and provide all the love and support that we can to those affected by this terrible catastrophe. It is time for serious action.”

State Sen. Heidi Campbell, a Nashville Democrat, spent the day at Covenant School reuniting parents with students in the church sanctuary. The school is also located in her district.

“No parent should have to go through this. This has been the worst waiting room I’ve ever sat in,” Campbell said.

Campbell, in part, blames what she calls a “diseased gun culture” for the shooting deaths. Tennessee passed a permitless carry law in July 2021 allowing anyone except felons, two-time DUI offenders and stalkers to carry handguns without a state permit process.

The law applies to residents 21 and older, but bills are moving this year in the General Assembly to lower the age limit to 18.

Campbell said when she spoke out against the legislation two years ago on the Senate floor, the bill’s sponsor told her “this is the price we pay for freedom.”

“This has nothing to do with freedom. This is the antithesis of freedom. These parents are sitting here with minutes turning into hours waiting to find out what’s happened to their children,” Campbell said.

Gov. Bill Lee said on Twitter early Monday afternoon he was monitoring the situation.

“As we continue to respond, please join us in praying for the school, congregation and Nashville community,” Lee said.

The House Republican Caucus issued a statement calling the shooting deaths “a horrific act of violence carried out by a disturbed individual.”

This is an ongoing story and will be updated as more information becomes available.

The national plan defines gender-based violence as any harmful threat or act directed at an individual or group based on actual or perceived sex, gender, gender identity, sex characteristics or sexual orientation. (Getty Images)

Kentucky can do more to protect some of its most vulnerable people, in particular women who are experiencing domestic violence.?

Women deserve the right to live their?lives free of violence, free of emotional and physical abuse, and free to carry on their daily activities without wondering if their abusive intimate partner will be waiting in the alley next to their workplace with a loaded gun.

Domestic violence perpetrators use guns to threaten, intimidate and assault their intimate partners as part of their coercive tactics to establish and maintain power and control. And all too often the abuse ends in homicide.

Research clearly demonstrates that domestic violence and guns are a lethal combination. When a male abuser has direct access to a firearm, the likelihood that he will choose to shoot and kill a? female partner increases by more than 1,000%.

Every month, across the United States, an average of 52 women are shot and killed by an intimate partner. Nationally, over half of all intimate partner homicides are committed with a firearm. In Kentucky, that figure goes up to 75%. Three in four domestic violence homicide victims in Kentucky were shot to death.

For years, survivors have been afforded the protection of laws prohibiting the purchase and possession of firearms for those convicted of qualifying misdemeanor crimes of domestic?violence and/or who are subject to certain domestic violence protective orders.

However, recently, two federal court rulings struck down one of these lifesaving protections for survivors of intimate partner violence. One of these rulings came from right here in the Eastern District of Kentucky.

In U.S. v. Rahimi, the Federal Fifth Circuit (Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi) Court of Appeals ruled that restricting possession of a firearm by someone subject to a domestic violence?restraining order is unconstitutional.?

In U.S. v. Combs, the U.S. District Court in Kentucky’s Eastern District granted a motion to dismiss charges of possession of a firearm while subject to a domestic violence order on the same basis.

According to current federal law, a person who is a convicted felon cannot have a firearm. This?includes someone who has stolen an item of $1,000 or more. But now a federal ruling in Kentucky allows batterers who are subject to a protective order to buy and possess a firearm even after a state court judge has determined that they committed domestic violence and that it may occur again.

If you were a survivor of domestic violence, would you be more afraid of someone who had shoplifted $1,000 worth of merchandise or your intimate partner who has time and time again pointed a firearm at your head with threats to kill you or your children or who has shot the family pet in front of you?

Kentucky women experience the highest percentage in the nation of sexual violence, physical violence and/or stalking by an intimate partner in their lifetime. An abuser can have access to a gun when we know that an abuser is five times more likely to kill a partner, a child, a family member, or a bystander than one without access to firearms.

This is not okay. We can do better.

The Kentucky Constitution promises “life, liberty, safety, and the pursuit of happiness” to the citizens of our commonwealth. We need to be the state that shows up for women and girls. We need to be the state that invests in bettering the social conditions for all Kentuckians.?

Adequate and nutritious food, safe and affordable housing, quality education and health care, meaningful work and benefits, and available childcare will help protect the well-being of all women and children, including survivors of domestic violence. Giving women the opportunity to be economically secure is the first step.

The next step is giving them the freedom to live and work without the fear of violence and to pursue happiness without having to constantly look over their shoulders.