3 Alabama youths charged with murder in ‘Sweet 16’ party shooting
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The shooting took place at the Mahogany Masterpiece Dance Studio in Dadeville, on April 15, 2023.
PHOTO: AFP
ALABAMA - Three Alabama youths have been taken into custody and charged with murder in a shooting at a “Sweet 16“ birthday party that left four dead and 32 wounded, a state police spokesman said on Wednesday.
Two suspects – Ty Reik McCullough, 17, and Travis McCullough, 16, both of Tuskegee – were arrested and charged with four counts of reckless murder, said Sergeant Jeremy Burkett of the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency at a news conference.
The agency said a few hours later in a press release that a third person had been arrested – Wilson LaMar Hill Jr, 20, of Auburn, was taken into custody on Wednesday afternoon and charged with four counts of reckless murder.
The shooting on Saturday took place at the Mahogany Masterpiece Dance Studio
“Make no mistake. This is Alabama and when you pull out a gun and you start shooting people, we’re going to put you in jail,” Sgt Burkett said.
“We’re tired of going to mothers and having to tell them these kids aren’t coming home.”
Of the nine injured who were still hospitalised, five were in critical condition, Ms Heidi Smith, a spokesman for Lake Martin Community Hospital, said at a news conference on Monday.
Three teenagers and a 23-year-old man were killed in the shooting.
One was a high school football player who was among those attending his sister’s birthday party.
The Montgomery Advertiser newspaper, quoting the victim’s grandmother, identified the slain football player as Mr Phil Dowdell, whom she said was set to graduate in a matter of weeks and planned to attend Jacksonville State University on a football scholarship.
The other deceased victims were identified as Ms Shaunkivia Smith, 17, Mr Marsiah Collins, 19, and Mr Corbin Holston, 23.
The shooting follows separate outbreaks of deadly gun violence in Tennessee and Kentucky that prompted local leaders to call for tighter gun control measures.
Mass shootings have become commonplace in the United States, with at least 165 so far in 2023, the most at this point in the year since at least 2016, according to the Gun Violence Archive.
The non-profit group defines a mass shooting as any in which four or more people are wounded or killed, not including the shooter. REUTERS
