A fatal shooting at a teen ‘pop-up’ party in north Houston, Texas has left two teens dead and three injured.
Police responded to a shooting near the 10100 block of Jensen Drive on Saturday night after gunshots rang through a ‘makeshift club’ full of teenagers, according to the Houston Police Department.
After arriving to the ‘very hectic scene’ at around 11:30 pm, police saw swarms of teens rushing out of an empty warehouse.
They found a 16-year-old boy dead at the scene and a critically injured 16-year-old girl who later died from her injuries at the hospital.
Three other teens – aged 13, 16 and 19 – were also shot and are being treated at Texas Children’s Hospital. The 13-year-old girl is in critical condition, while the 16 and 19-year-old girls sustained non-fatal wounds, according to police.
The suspect fled the scene by the time authorities arrived, the Houston Police Department wrote in a statement.
Sheriff Ed Gonzalez warned on X: ‘These makeshift, unsanctioned pop-up parties can quickly lead to chaos and violence. These parties quickly come together via social media.
‘Pop-up parties raise public safety concerns and teens need to stay away for their own safety.’
Houston Mayor John Whitmire was on the scene after the shooting and noted that the security guards ‘took off’ and the party was totally unregulated.
Police have launched a manhunt to uncover who is responsible for Saturday night’s tragedy. Authorities have also asked for the community’s help.
‘We are going to put all our resources into finding out what happened tonight, and who did this so we can bring them to justice,’ Assistant Chief Luis Menendez-Sierra said at a news conference after the shooting.
‘If you were here tonight, we need your help. If you were a witness to what happened, we need you to call [the tip line]. We need you to give us information so we can bring these people to justice.’
‘We lost some young people tonight, that was very preventable if they didn’t come to locations such as this,’ Whitmire said.
In August, another a Texas teen died just weeks before his 18th birthday at a raging teenage party in a vacant newly-built home.
Landon Reyes, 17, was found dead with gunshot wounds in the backyard of the empty property after being shot at the drug-fueled party in Brookmill in Bexar County.
He was one of more than 100 teens who were near the 3900 block of Rock Mill Dam for the late-night rager. Bexar Sheriff County Josie Salazaar described the event as a ‘recipe for disaster.’
The sheriff said the teens typically learn about these parties via social media and then show up to ‘stage a takeover,’ similar to Saturday night’s incident in Houston.
Salazaar added that deputies had broken up a party at the same property just two weeks earlier.