At least one person is dead and several are wounded following a shooting at a zombie-themed halloween festival in downtown Fort Myers, Florida Saturday night.
Thousands of panicked revelers shouted as they ran away from the site where gunshots rang out at around 11:30 p.m. ET, videos posted to social media show.
shooting at zombiecon no biggy pic.twitter.com/z7865AhH5t— Sav (@savannahholdenn) October 18, 2015
Five were shot, officials said, four of which have non-life threatening injuries and are being treated at a local hospital, according to news reporters on the ground. A suspect has yet to be apprehended, police said at an early Sunday morning press conference in front of city hall. No description of the suspect was given.
FMPD is currently investigating a shots fired incident that occurred during the Zombicon event in Downtown Fort Mye… pic.twitter.com/s0HYvQ5zWS— Fort Myers Police (@fortmyerspolice) October 18, 2015
.@fortmyerspolice PIO at city hall talking to media re. shooting at #ZombieCon. "We have a suspect at large." pic.twitter.com/vq3YyqKPAa— Patrick Riley (@PatJRiley) October 18, 2015
Fort Myers PD spokesman: five shot, one dead @ndn— Greg Stanley (@GregGStanley) October 18, 2015
Man being taken away on a stretcher by medics. @TheNewsPress #SWFL pic.twitter.com/hlf9wNyREW— Ben Brasch (@ben_brasch) October 18, 2015
People at the scene uploaded videos to social media showing police and emergency responders tending to the victims.
Man being taken away on a stretcher by medics. @TheNewsPress #SWFL pic.twitter.com/hlf9wNyREW— Ben Brasch (@ben_brasch) October 18, 2015
By 7 p.m., nearly 10,000 people crowded downtown streets for the event, which featured live music, costumed attendees and food, but event organizers said at the time they expected 25,000 people by the end of the night.
Organizers of the fundraising street festival, Pushing DaiZies, an arts nonprofit, reached out to family members of those affected by the shooting on Facebook.
(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.3"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));The organizers of Zombicon, Pushing DaiZies, Inc. are deeply saddened by the news of what happened within the footprint...Posted by ZombiCon on Saturday, October 17, 2015
Additional reporting by Ariel Bogle.