12 people shot near Old West End Festival — Full press conference

[0:00] hello everyone thanks for being here i'm officer i'm sergeant muhammad ali nasser i'm the public [0:06] information officer for the toledo police department i'm going to go ahead and introduce [0:12] our deputy chief joseph heffernan to give you guys a quick update what's going on sir thanks mo [0:21] thanks everybody for coming out today we had some unfortunate incident happened here in toledo [0:26] uh at about 5 37 pm we got a report of some shots fired near our old west end festival [0:34] which is a festival we have every year officers were quick to respond they were right there when [0:41] the shots were coming out appears as though there was at least two shooters i think they were probably [0:50] shooting at each other and ended up happening was 12 people were struck with bullets [0:59] that's what we have right now two of them critical processing the scene the we do have some evidence [1:10] and we're following upon some leads it's pretty active right now as far as the investigative part [1:16] part of this goes the scene itself is secured matter of fact i think we're just about breaking [1:21] down the scene right now as far as the initial process does anybody have any questions we have [1:31] suspects in custody uh no suspects in custody uh no suspects in custody right now we're still very early in [1:38] the investigative process do you have persons of interest that you're looking specifically uh i might [1:43] turn this over to our investigative lieutenant uh lieutenant dan gurken uh he can probably answer some [1:49] of those more specific questions as far as the investigation goes yeah as the deputy chief said it's real early in [1:57] the investigation right so it's been three hours we're talking to multiple people including victims [2:03] witnesses reviewing camera footage uh we're doing a whole lot of stuff that i can't sit here and tell you [2:12] everything that we have or what we're going to have because i don't know what we're going to have [2:16] all right so we're we're we're way early in this for the questions about what we have or who uh who we want [2:23] caught all right uh i'm going to tell you i'm feeling good about where we're at right now um but we're going [2:30] to need the community's help when the time comes a bunch of people were out there that could probably help [2:37] us with our investigation we'll take all the information there is all right but as far as who we're [2:43] looking for what we've collected and all that so far that's for another time all right the main [2:49] thing is here is here is if you have information you send it to the police department so we can follow [2:54] up on it so nothing in terms of a general description or anything like that no not as of yet no [3:00] of the 12 people hurt either one of them one of gunmen by chance uh at this moment i don't believe so at least that [3:07] information hasn't been uh relayed to me uh uh i think i would know that at this point but uh right now i don't believe so [3:17] has the festival seen violence like this before you know uh i've been around the police department we all [3:23] have for a long time within the city uh as far as violence this is this is over the top right so [3:31] so 12 people being shot that's the most uh i've been to a scene i've been to a lot of scenes but this is [3:38] this is way over the top and i know it's still early but do you have any age ranges of the victims um i'm gonna [3:45] tell you the oldest person i talked to was 61 the youngest one i talked to was 14. a lot of them are [3:53] teenagers in that 14 as far as who were shot uh i'm gonna tell you that that was pretty young i want to [4:01] tell you most everybody the the multiple people that i talked to i would say if you want an average i'd say early [4:08] 2020s and they started shooting like around the crowd like an addictive crowd yeah i again we are at the [4:17] mercy of the evidence and the video that we're collecting so we're going to try to be able to [4:20] figure that out and we'll be able to tell you once we review all that we collected it a couple hours ago [4:26] we got people going through it i can't really tell you exactly where everybody is there'll be a time for [4:32] that and just for accuracy you said the oldest correct correct you seem relatively positive how how what do [4:42] what do you mean i thought i i i'm feeling good where we're at as far as what we've collected so far [4:48] and by detectives and sergeants and and the other people that uh police department are doing their jobs [4:54] so so yeah i'm confident are you that you'll be able to apprehend these two well i bet you if i get we get help [5:02] from the community it'll be hopefully sooner than later but again it's been three hours so you're asking [5:09] for i'm guessing video video information uh talk to your kids there's kids out there that probably [5:15] know more than all of us standing here right so if they can help us uh help us out that'd be great [5:22] what security measures were in place prior to the shooting happening way past my i can talk about that okay yeah uh [5:29] we had extra officers uh on duty today for the festival plus there was a large contingency [5:36] of off-duty officers that were working for the festival itself we had our mobile security cameras [5:46] that go right into our real-time crime center active so there is a lot of evidence [5:52] uh it's just a matter of going through a lot of that evidence um and we it happened very quickly um but it [6:01] also stopped pretty quickly because there was a lot of officers that were right there and just from [6:08] officials you know being that this was supposed to be a day of jubilation and fun to be spoiled by [6:14] something like this well yeah you know it's just a shame you know when you a few people uh for whatever [6:24] reasons uh going through their head decided to uh disrupt something that has been a beloved [6:33] community event for many many many years uh we had the security in place just so that we [6:43] something like this wouldn't happen and unfortunately best laid plans that happened anyway [6:48] but those are things that we have to kind of do when we're going to dissect what happened and [6:56] we're going to do when we're going to do when we're going to do when we're going to do we're going to [6:59] be one of them you know why would somebody do something like this it's just uh it's horrible [7:05] and summer's just getting started is there anything you want to say to people who may come [7:10] to different events but not the right intentions well i would say that i think everybody has to treat [7:19] people like they would like to be treated uh and if we have some people out there some uh groups of young [7:30] young people that are um thinking that this is exciting uh it's not uh this is a perfect example [7:40] you know of how when bullets start flying it they can go anywhere they can strike anybody so i know [7:49] that we're going to be out there this we've already made some plans to do some community outreach [7:55] especially uh with the juveniles in in this uh city to do some more community policing and uh outreach [8:05] to them about uh violence and the consequences of violence like this so at uh who's next uh councilman [8:20] at this at this time we'll introduce safety director george crawl the city of toledo thank you [8:27] sergeant um i am george crawl i'm the director of public safety for the city and former police chief here [8:36] i'm representing mayor kepsikevich who is out of town right now i'm going to echo what lieutenant [8:42] gerkin and and deputy chief heffernan was saying regarding the need for public input there were several [8:50] hundred people there tonight and everybody has one of these i know in my heart that footage is out there [9:01] so i am imploring uh my fellow toledoans to look through your cell phone video and reach out to tpd [9:10] and help them catch the people who did this this is one of the the most iconic festivals in toledo [9:20] and it's a shame that something like this had to ruin it so please i i know there's information out [9:28] there please help us help you and just to go upset about through their footage and seeing what they [9:37] come on what about people who may be worried that if they step forward we have mechanisms in place to [9:43] make sure that those people are safe we have crime stopper that is completely anonymous i challenge [9:52] anyone who resides in this city that does not have a friend who is a toledo police officer and can reach [9:59] out and have those one-on-one conversations if someone is worried about their personal safety we can [10:05] take care of that all right this is a dumb question but will the festival go on tomorrow that is not a dumb [10:12] question at all we are in discussions with them right now we are going to talk with the festival [10:20] leadership with our with toledo places leadership and i'm assuming that decision will be made later on [10:26] tonight all right all right we have um fire chief allison armstrong with us here today or tonight um did [10:37] anybody have any questions maybe for her related to um this incident yeah imagine it was your team [10:49] that that treated the wounded you give us a range of injuries that you treated tonight well so everything is [10:57] still being collected i was on the scene it was a large scene over a dozen victims as the police stated so i don't have [11:04] that specific information but i can tell you firing ems crews responded immediately they went into the [11:09] scene once it was secured by toledo police began treating triaging and then working on plans to [11:13] transport those patients as you can imagine it was a large festival area roads are closed and then [11:18] people are leaving the scene which makes it difficult for us to get our rigs in and out so the i [11:24] want also want to mention the toledo police department helped us treat those patients they applied [11:28] tourniquets to some of them and to my best knowledge four to five were considered critical and all the [11:35] patients were off the scene within an hour which is pretty impressive given the scope of things and the [11:40] challenges that the crews faced give us a sense of the logistics you had to overcome to make that happen [11:46] it's very challenging because because the festival was already in place we had a lot of road closures to [11:51] begin with and then there's cars parked everywhere there's people on golf carts there's people walking [11:56] and so just the ingress and egress out of that area was very very difficult and then you have police coming in on top of [12:03] that closing more roads so really that was our biggest challenge just for confirmation you said more [12:08] than a dozen how many people were affected by this today at least 13 but we're still collecting [12:15] information we're still getting numbers because we treated people on scene but also sometimes people [12:20] leave they hop in cars or they get a ride to the hospital so i don't have those numbers tpd would have the exact [12:25] numbers you've got to be proud of the response of your office i'm very very proud of the fire and rescue [12:32] department like i said to get 12 13 14 patients off scene in conditions like that in an hour is [12:39] impressive they did an amazing job and kudos to toledo police for securing and helping them get that done [12:45] okay at this time i'm going to introduce councilman john hobbs with the city of toledo council thank you [12:57] all for being tonight first of all i'm extremely thankful for the response of our first responders [13:06] of our fire department of our police department of our detectives to move in an environment like they [13:13] did today with the crowd and everything else was an amazing effort on everyone's part i also want to say [13:21] that what happened today is not a reflection of what our city is and what we stand for and so we are [13:29] hoping that as a community we will come together and get this solved quickly there has to be a tone set [13:38] early on with summer just starting that this type of behavior will not be tolerated and if anyone is [13:47] thinking about doing something like this the community is going to respond quickly to put an [13:54] end to this type of behavior so we need everyone that thought they saw something that had a phone out [14:03] that may have been recording something else or looking to check back and please help the victims of [14:11] this situation if it were your mom or dad brother sister son or daughter you would want an immediate [14:19] response and you would want there to be immediate penalties for what has taken place so put yourself [14:28] in the place of those families that are in those hospital rooms right now in the waiting areas put [14:33] yourself in place of parents and seniors or children that might be watching a parent suffer and ask what [14:44] you would do to get resolved to this situation this is the effort and the energy that is needed today [14:53] right now help our detectives get this taken care of because we have to set a tone that this will not be [15:01] tolerated anymore in our city at any event that is yet to come there's so much planned this summer for our youth [15:11] for our concert series for different things that we have taken place the fourth of july all of these our [15:19] parades we need to come out as a community and protect our own and make sure others understand we will come [15:27] together together and this will not be acceptable behavior for the rest of this summer nor any time thank you [15:37] just want to close it out with all you thanks for being patient with us we're just gathering info and we [15:44] appreciate your time and you being out here so thank you can we get the just spoken get the your spelling of your [15:57] name please step up to the mic deputy chief joe heffernan h-e-f-f-e-r-n-a-n your deputy chief yes [16:17] Allison Armstrong a-l-l-i-s-o-n-a-r-m-s-t-r-o-n-g i'm the fire chief for the toledo fire and rescue [16:24] department and i am george crawl g-e-o-r-g-e-k-r-a-l and i am the director of public safety [16:33] the city of toledo yes sir i'm john hobbs iii toledo city council district one and i am the chair [16:45] of public safety i am lieutenant dan gherkin i'm in the detective bureau the last name is spelled g-e-r-k-e-n [16:57] it's 12 people shot at least as of right now