At least 1 dead and 3 injured after shootings at Mississippi universities
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A shooting was reported at around 6.30pm local time near a building at Alcorn State University in Lorman, Mississippi on Oct 11.
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Rylee Kirk and Mark Walker
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At least one person was killed and two others were wounded in a shooting at a university campus in Mississippi on the night of Oct 11, as a separate shooting outside a college football stadium in the state capital left a child injured, the authorities said.
The shootings, both at historically black institutions, occurred within about 24 hours of three other shootings across rural Mississippi that left at least eight people dead. Two of those earlier shootings occurred on public high school campuses that were hosting Friday night football games.
On Oct 11, one person was found dead and two others with apparent gunshot wounds after a shooting was reported around 6.30pm local time near a building at Alcorn State University in Lorman, the Mississippi Department of Public Safety said in a statement.
The university later said on social media that the campus was closed until further notice.
No arrests have been made and the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation was taking over the investigation, the public safety department said.
Separately, a shooting in a tailgate area outside a football stadium at Jackson State University on the evening of Oct 11 left a child wounded in the abdomen, said Mr Bailey Martin, a spokesman for the Department of Public Safety. The child’s condition was not immediately clear.
The department said no arrests had been made. Hinds County sheriff Tyree Jones said in a statement that officers were clearing the stadium and the tailgate area.
Alcorn State University is near Mississippi’s border with Louisiana and about 121km by road south-west of Jackson.
Several shootings occurred on Oct 10 and 11, which was homecoming weekend, a poignant and celebratory ritual in Mississippi, particularly in rural areas where people return to small towns they left after high school.
In Heidelberg, Mississippi, two people were killed late on Oct 10 on a high school campus. Six others were killed early on Oct 11 as a crowd celebrated homecoming weekend on Main Street in Leland, in the same US state. No arrests had been made in either case as at the evening of Oct 11.
Another shooting took place on Oct 10 in Rolling Fork, Mississippi, on a high school campus after a football game. A 17-year-old was shot twice and was in stable condition as at Oct 11 night, said a spokesperson for the Sharkey County Sheriff’s Department.
Two people were arrested after the Rolling Fork shooting, and they were each charged with one count of aggravated assault, the spokesperson said. NYTIMES
