Seattle police recovered a modified machine gun and an untraceable “ghost gun” from the scene of a mass shooting at a food festival this weekend that left three people dead – including one of the suspects – and at least five more wounded, the police chief, Shon Barnes, said on Tuesday.
Sunday’s shooting appeared to involve at least three suspects, Barnes said at a televised news conference. One of those three, 19-year-old Junior Cee Niko Semo, died at the scene. A second, 15-year-old suspect was disarmed and arrested at the scene. At least one more suspect remains at large, Barnes said.
The shooting broke out in the middle of a three-day food festival at Seattle Center, a park located near the city’s Space Needle.
Two people whom Seattle police say were uninvolved in the shooting were killed: Carlos Israel Sanchez Villalba, 44, and Ashley Whitehead, 56. People wounded by crossfire included a two-year-old boy. Others were trampled as the crowd rushed to safety.
Casings from fired cartridges and three pistols were recovered from the scene, police say.
Police seized a 9mm ghost gun produced from a parts kit made by the now-defunct company Polymer80 from the 15-year-old suspect at the scene. They also recovered a Glock pistol modified with an auto sear, or “switch”, allowing it to be fired as a fully automatic machine gun.
Both of those pistols had extended magazines, with the Glock holding 40 rounds and the ghost gun holding 33. The state of Washington generally bans firearms from carrying more than 10 rounds.
Both types of weapon have raised concerns among law enforcement officials in recent years, for different reasons. Illegal machine guns increase a firearm’s rate of fire while reducing the shooter’s accuracy. Ghost guns make it easier for prohibited persons to acquire firearms and harder for law enforcement officials to trace weapons used in crimes.
The third gun, a .45-caliber pistol, was not used in the crime. Police did not so far believe that any of the recovered firearms had been stolen, though authorities were still working on tracing the two serialized guns.
Cheap, user-installed auto sears or switches that allow shooters to convert semiautomatic pistols into fully automatic machine guns have proliferated in the age of 3D printing and internet shopping. Unserialized “ghost guns” were legal to buy and assemble under federal law from parts kit manufacturers like Polymer80, until the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives started regulating them as firearms in 2022.
The advent of 3D printing, however, has made it easier for private individuals to produce ghost guns illegally.
Police were still trying to locate a person who showed up at a nearby hospital with what may have been a gunshot wound, but had not been confirmed as a victim of Sunday’s shooting, Barnes said.
Authorities are continuing to review physical evidence, digital recordings and camera footage from the shooting scene to reconstruct what happened and locate at least one suspect who remains at large. There may be more than one at-large suspect involved in the shooting, Barnes said.
The shooting was probably linked to gang violence, according to Seattle police. “We’re working to determine the groups involved and what their relationship may be,” Barnes said.
