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9 people shot in Ohio club mass shooting

Sunday, 16 April 2017 3:10 PM [ Last Update: Sunday, 16 April 2017 5:01 PM ]

Police vehicles park outside a nightclub where nine people were shot, Columbus, Ohio, April 16, 2017. (Social media photo)

At least 9 people have been shot in a mass shooting at a nightclub in the US state of Ohio.

The incident took place early on Sunday in the state’s capital, Columbus, the city’s police department said, adding that multiple shooters involved in the attack were still on the run.

Two of the injured were in critical condition with life-threatening injuries, while the rest were expected to recover, police confirmed. Four men and five women were shot.

Police said they had no information on the shooters or the reason behind the shooting.

This was the second club shooting in Ohio in recent weeks. On March 26, two people were killed and at least 15 others were injured after a gunman opened fire in a nightclub in Cincinnati.

Police described that incident as a “shootout” and not a “shooting,” blaming it on two rivaling neighborhood gangs that decided to use their guns and settle a dispute “over nothing.”

“This wasn't like somebody going into a school and trying to create a body count,” Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters said back then. “These were guys shooting at each other and many innocent people were in between the two.”

The exterior of the Cameo Night Club after a shooting that left one man dead and injuring 15 others in Cincinnati, Ohio, March 26, 2017. (Photo by AFP)

This is while on Saturday, two more people were killed in an Ohio shooting while a third person was shot and injured. Police said a family feud led to the shooting.

Statistics by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show that firearms kill more than 33,000 people in the US every year, a number that includes accidental discharges, murders and suicides.

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It is estimated that there are between 270 million and 300 million guns in the US, about one per person, according to the New York Daily News.

In early March, US President Donald Trump drew fire by approving a bill that removes legal restrictions for people with severe mental illness to purchase firearms.

The law allows over 750,000 people, who are considered too mentally ill or otherwise unable to manage their own disability benefits, to freely purchase guns, rolling back limitations put in place by former president Barack Obama. The rollback fulfills one of Trump’s campaign promises on loosening gun control.

The move was hailed by the National Rifle Association (NRA), one of Trump’s major supporters during last year’s presidential race.

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