A Milwaukee Juneteenth celebration ended in bloodshed Monday when six teens were shot leaving the police chief asking, “what’s going on with our children?”

(Video: Fox 6)

Thousands were said to have gathered in downtown Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to mark the city’s 52nd annual Juneteenth parade Monday, but the celebratory atmosphere was tarnished by the afternoon when girls brawling escalated to gunfire.

Video captured the tense moments leading up to weapons being drawn as the groups clashed and separated with fists flying as they converged again moving back and forth along the street. While some onlookers laughed, the conflict quickly turned serious when two teens were believed to exchange shots.

Along with the 19- and 17-year-old males who were both arrested as suspects in the shooting, four females aged 14, 16, 17, and 18 were said to have suffered gunshot wounds around 4:21 p.m., according to the Milwaukee Police Department (MPD).

“They were transported to a local hospital for treatment of non-fatal injuries,” the press release said.

MPD Investigates Sextuple Shooting pic.twitter.com/oHY29xrS4X

— Milwaukee Police (@MilwaukeePolice) June 20, 2023

Later, when addressing the press, Milwaukee Police Chief Jeffrey B. Norman asked, “Milwaukee, what’s going on with our children?”

“Parents, guardians, elders, we need to engage in ensuring that this violence that our children are bringing these streets ceases. No handgun, no weapons of destruction, should be in the hands of our young ones,” he argued. “This is a story that plays out too often, and it’s getting really old. Really old.”

Mayor Cavalier Johnson shared in that sentiment as he called the incident, “totally unacceptable.”

“We had thousands and thousands of people here celebrating and bringing themselves together and having a sense of community,” he detailed. “That’s a powerful thing. That’s the true story about what this day is.”

“There were families out here. There were kids out here. There were babies out here,” the mayor lamented. “If you are an adult or a young person, you’ve got your hands on a gun, and you are ill-tempered, right? Don’t come to stuff like this. Don’t come. Get the help you need. You don’t have the right to steal the joy that this community felt. You don’t have the right to endanger babies in this community. You don’t have the right to put men and women of this department and our partners in the Office of Violence Prevention in harm’s way because you want to go out there and act stupid with a gun, and that’s what it is, it’s stupidity.”

Monday’s shooting in Milwaukee wasn’t the only such celebration that ended with tragedy as a Chicago-area mall also experienced violence that injured at least 20 and killed at least one. Meanwhile, another shooting injured at least 10 minors in ST. Louis, Missouri.

20 shot, 1 dead in Chicago-area mall as violence mars Juneteenth holiday weekend around US https://t.co/bS7xq9TKqZ via @BIZPACReview

— BPR based (@DumpstrFireNews) June 18, 2023

Witness Camelia Pickett commented on the shooting in Milwaukee and told Fox 6, “It’s sad. How can we celebrate when it’s our own, our children that are doing the shootings?”

Commentator Candace Owens spoke to that Monday when she tweeted out “Juneteenth is still ghetto and made up,” and later added, “Foremost, black American culture has gotten ghetto. I know you’re used to the media lying to black Americans pretending that higher murder rates, illiterate children, and degenerate music is ‘progress’, [because] ‘oh look, we gave you Juneteenth!’ — but I’m not falling for the bullsh*t.”

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Kevin Haggerty

Staff Writer

Native of Brooklyn, NY, Kevin Haggerty is a graduate of Hunter College where he studied Cultural Anthropology and Geography. An avid reader and truth seeker, he currently resides in Texas with his wife and their dog and, when he isn't researching current events and their impacts, you'll find him spending time with friends and family or working on his next novel.

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