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| Photo Credit: AP. |
WEST MIFFLIN, Pa. (AP) — A 15-year-old has been arrested in last month’s shooting at a western Pennsylvania amusement park that wounded three people, including two teenagers.
Allegheny
County and West Mifflin police said last week that the teenager is being
charged as an adult with aggravated assault, reckless endangering and firearms
crimes in the Sept. 24 gunfire at Kennywood Park on the opening night of the
park’s Phantom Fall Fest.
Park
officials said the late Saturday night shooting followed an altercation between
two groups of teenagers near the Musik Express ride at the park in West
Mifflin, southeast of Pittsburgh. A 39-year-old man and two 15-year-old boys
were taken to hospitals with leg wounds, authorities said.
Investigators
said last week that evidence recovered at the scene indicated that there were
two guns fired, one of them by the teenager arrested. He himself was also
grazed on the thigh by a bullet, and authorities are searching for a second
suspect, which Christopher Kearns, the county police superintendent, said is
“most likely” a juvenile.
Kennywood
closed for the day after the shooting and announced new security measures
including more police, more security along perimeter fences, limits on bag
sizes and masks covering faces and requiring adult chaperones for all juveniles
at all times during the Fall Fest, scheduled to run until mid-October.
Kearns said
it remains unclear how the weapons got into the park, and investigators are
still looking at the possibility that the weapons were tossed over the park
fence or carried by someone jumping the fence. Officials said they are cutting
down trees along the perimeter fence to improve visibility and installing new
floodlights and security cameras to completely cover the fence line. They also
vowed to “significantly” increase security patrols.
Authorities
said they believe the gunfire stemmed from a feud between two groups of
teenagers that has led to scores of shootings in several Mon Valley
communities. Victor Joseph, county police assistant superintendent, cited 55
calls for shots fired in Duquesne and Homestead, the communities of the rival
groups.
“We all know
that this is a serious problem,” Joseph said. “The people who live in these
communities know how serious it is. People who have lost loved ones due to gun
violence and incarceration know how devastating it is.”
This story
has been corrected to show the dateline is West Mifflin, Pa., not Ohio.