The Kansas City police chief, Stacey Graves, has said that a mass shooting at a celebration for the city’s Super Bowl-winning team on Tuesday appears to have been a private dispute among several parties that ended in gunfire.
The shooting killed a local radio DJ and injured at least 22 others, including 11 children. Victims were aged between eight and 47, the police chief said.
Graves also confirmed that three people, two of them juveniles, were arrested in connection with the shooting, which took place as the celebration for the Kansas City Chiefs was wrapping up near Union station.
Graves earlier said that firearms were recovered. An eyewitness, Trey Filter, has said he believes one of the weapons used was an AK-47 assault rifle. Police have said they are still piecing together what happened and have not yet released details about those who were detained or a possible motive.
Missouri’s Republican governor, Mike Parson, on Thursday blamed “a bunch of criminals, thugs” for the shooting. “What happened yesterday with those thugs is not who we are in Missouri,” Parson said on KCMO radio. “And we’re not, and it’s just a shame they got center stage yesterday under an event that should have been a totally positive event.”
Filter, a Chiefs fan from Wichita, ran and tackled one of the suspected gunmen who appeared to be fleeing the scene. Filter knocked the man to the ground before another man joined to help him pin the suspect.
“I was just yelling, ‘Eff your gun!’ and I was just hitting him in his ribs. It was great. You know, America stuff,” Filter told the New York Post.
Filter’s wife, Casey, then picked up an assault-style weapon from the ground and moved it out of harm’s way.
“It was fight or flight,” Casey told NewsNation’s Chris Cuomo of her and her husband’s response.
“I didn’t expect to just have it at my feet,” Casey Filter said of the gun. “I just saw it and just moved it.”
Trey Filter added: “I turn, I see a flash, and I think to myself, ‘I hope that’s him. All I recall was barely seeing the guy. And I couldn’t believe I caught him.”
Police could not confirm that the suspect was one of the arrested but were seeking to connect the dots. “We do have three persons detained and under investigation for today’s incident,” Graves said at a press conference. “We are working to determine if one of the three are the one that was in that video, where fans assisted police.”
Graves added that “bad actors” were responsible for the violence as officials said they did not currently suspect a terrorist attack.
The community radio station KKFI said Lisa Lopez-Galvan of Johnson county was killed in the shooting. She was the co-host of Taste of Tejano, a Hispanic music program. Friends of the family later confirmed Lopez-Galvan’s death to the Kansas City Star.
Lopez-Galvan was reported to have died at a hospital while receiving surgery for a gunshot wound to her abdomen. She was in her mid-40s and had two children.
“She was the most wonderful, beautiful person,” said Lisa Lopez, a friend and an executive administrative assistant at the Star. “She was a local DJ. She did everybody’s weddings. We all know her. She was so full of life.” Lopez confirmed her friend was a huge Chiefs fan and had asked her that day for a copy of the newspaper to commemorate the Super Bowl victory.
“It is with sincere sadness and an extremely heavy and broken heart that we let our community know that KKFI DJ Lisa Lopez, host of Taste of Tejano lost her life today in the shooting at the KC Chiefs’ rally,” the radio station wrote on Facebook. “This senseless act has taken a beautiful person from her family and this KC Community.”
Police have not yet released victims’ names.
“I will legislate, I will fight and I WILL do everything in my power to change this state and city for the better”, said Manny Abarca, a local legislator, on social media, adding he had known Lopez-Galvan for years and using the hashtag #GunReformNow.
Among the injured, 11 children are being treated at Children’s Mercy Kansas City, nine of them for gunshot wounds. All the children are expected to recover from their injuries, according to the hospital’s senior vice-president Stephanie Meyer. The minors in their care are between the ages of six and 15. An adult who is a parent of one of the children is also being treated there.
Joe Biden released a statement urging action on gun control, saying that for such an attack to occur during a Super Bowl parade “cuts deep in the American soul”.
“Today’s events should move us, shock us, shame us into acting. What are we waiting for? What else do we need to see? How many more families need to be torn apart?” he said.
The president urged people to make their voices heard in Congress for action to ban assault weapons, limit high-capacity magazines and strengthen background checks.
Hundreds of people who gathered to celebrate the Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory over the San Francisco 49ers ran for shelter as the gunfire began. Video footage showed a hectic scene near Union station as police and first responders rushed to lead people to safety.
Witnesses, in harrowing accounts, described fleeing from gunfire. A high school student told the Kansas City Star that he injured himself while running away from the shots. “The security guard was like, ‘Get over the damn fence right now, there’s a shooter.’ When I was hopping over the barricade, my foot hit [it] and my face nailed the concrete,” Gabe Wallace told the newspaper.
“I have no idea if my friends are OK,” he told the Star. “It’s terrible … I’m literally thinking, most of my friends are dead. That’s all that went through my mind, like, ‘Are my friends dead or not?’”
The violence drew widespread condemnation from sports figures and authorities alike. The NFL team issued a statement confirming that all of its players, staff and families were safe, calling the shooting a “senseless act of violence”.
The players expressed gratitude to the emergency personnel who responded. The Chiefs’ quarterback, Patrick Mahomes, posted on Twitter/X that he was “praying for Kansas City”, while teammate Drue Tranquill encouraged people to “pray that doctors and first responders would have steady hands and that all would experience full healing”. Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce said he was “heartbroken”, tweeting: “KC, you mean the world to me.”
The Chiefs guard Trey Smith posted on X: “My thoughts and prayers are with everyone affected by today’s incidents – a huge thank you to the first responders who ran towards the sound of danger. You’re the ones who should be celebrated today.”
