4 shot, injured in Oakland Juneteenth celebration

On Wednesday night, shots rang out during a Juneteenth celebration in Oakland, California. At least four people were struck by bullets and taken to the hospital, though their identities and conditions have not been released. 

While one attendee was arrested for assaulting an officer as police guided the crowd to a safe place, those suspected of committing the crime were still at large after the shooting.  

According to ABC7, the incident took place at around 9 pm at Grand and Euclid Avenues near Lake Merritt. When police arrived on scene, they discovered a number of victims in various states. They were promptly transported to a nearby hospital while law enforcement attempted to rein in the crowd. 

"At this time, there are no reports of fatalities, and the exact number of those injured is still under investigation," Oakland police said in a statement at 1:30am Thursday. "No arrests have been made in connection with the shooting. It is currently unknown if there was a single shooter or multiple shooters involved." 

Witness Tamia Robinson told KTVU that things all kicked off with "a couple fights," explaining that, "Next thing you know we all thought that we heard fireworks, so what we did was we ran from this direction. Next thing you hear another 'boom boom boom boom boom' from the other side of the lake, we come down here, we're walkin' and my sister sprints across the street where she seen one of her friends laying out choking on his blood." 

"We all came out here to celebrate our culture, our freedom," she continued. "You see people are still out here singing and dancing; this is not fun. Just two or three years ago this happened, and it seems to be a repeating cycle. There needs to be some kind of change to the community." 

During celebrations in 2021, a 22-year-old was killed and six others were injured near the same location. The shooting was believed to be tied to San Francisco gang activity.