Christmas Day shootings kill 27, wound 63 in US
In a grim reminder that violence in America never takes a holiday, 27 people were killed and 63 injured in shooting incidents on Christmas Day this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive. This tally does not include people who shot themselves in suicide, The Washington Post reported.
The number of Americans killed in gun homicides on Christmas Day is comparable to the number of people killed in gun homicides in an entire year in places such as Australia or Britain. The 27 people killed by guns in America on Christmas this year is equal to the total number of people killed in gun homicides in an entire year in Austria, New Zealand, Norway, Slovenia, Estonia, Bermuda, Hong Kong and Iceland combined.
The dead included the parents of a young child who were shot during a robbery in Columbus. Victor F. Mendez Paredes, 21, and Sayuri Casas Yerena, 18, were shot multiple times in their car in a suspected robbery at the Wynds apartment complex off Petzinger Road on the East Side. Police had made no arrests by Monday night.
They also included a Texas grandfather, whose 73-year-old wife said she shot him for “continuous marital issues and infidelities”; a young couple killed in their vehicle early in the morning near Augusta, Maine; and the owner of a barbershop in Alabama who was known as “a strong voice against crime” in the community, according to local news reports.
At least two of the Christmas Day shootings qualified as mass shooting incidents with four or more people shot. In one, a 2-year old girl and three teenagers were injured in a shooting in a high-crime neighborhood in Jacksonville, Fla. Later that night in Mobile, Ala., four teenagers were shot by two gunmen outside a movie theater.