MONTGOMERY, Ala. — A suspect was arrested Sunday in connection with a shooting that killed one person and injured more than a dozen others on the last day of homecoming week at Tuskegee University.
La’Tavion Johnson, 18, has been identified as the deceased victim, according to NPR. Johnson, who was not a student at the school, died at the scene. Twelve injured victims were taken to area hospitals with gunshot wounds while four more sustained other injuries. University spokesperson Kawana McGough said Tuskegee University students were among the wounded.
According to the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency (ALEA), the suspect, 25-year-old Jaquez Myrick, was found leaving the scene of the shooting and carrying a handgun with a machine gun conversion device. Myrick was arrested and charged federally with possession of a machine gun. No one has been charged in Johnson’s death or the other injuries.
Macon County Sheriff Andre Brunson said based on the amount of shots that were fired, “there’s going to be multiple shooters.”
“I want to say one thing to the people that were shooting: We’re going to make sure we find you,” Brown said. “We’re not going to let them disrupt what we do here in Tuskegee.”
Shooting Happened at Non-Sanctioned Campus Event
The shooting took place around 1:40 a.m. Sunday at an event that was not approved in advance by the university and was not sanctioned by officials, said Tuskegee University President Mark Brown.
“Nonetheless, it happened on campus, and we take full responsibility for allowing a thorough investigation and implementing corrective actions,” Brown said. “Students are our greatest asset, and we will do everything possible to protect them.”
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Brunson said officers were told an active shooter was barricaded in a dorm and raced past injured victims before learning there was no shooter at the dorm, ABC reports.
“We had to immediately go there. You have to take out the threat first and we found out that it wasn’t that case at that time,” Brunson said. “As we were running to that dorm, trying to get to the active shooter, we saw people hurt, we saw people laying down, people asking for help. But we had to tell them, ‘We’ll be back.'”
According to a newly unsealed federal complaint, one officer ran toward the gunfire and discovered Johnson deceased from a gunshot wound, AP News reports. The officer then saw Myrick, who was armed with a Glock pistol, and took him into custody, the complaint says. The officer gave the gun to a special agent who wrote the complaint.
“During a field examination, I found the pistol to function as a machine gun,” the federal agent wrote.
Myrick was later questioned by state and federal agents, who asked him whether he discharged his firearm during the shooting. Myrick reportedly confessed to discharging the firearm but denied shooting at anyone.
Law Enforcement Warns of Machine Gun Conversion Devices
Myrick, who is not a student at Tuskegee, told investigators he went to the campus “looking for a party” and was with some friends when the shooting started. He said he purchased the Glock from a pawn shop in Tampa, Fla., and then purchased a machine gun conversion device from a seller he met through the online site Discord. Myrick said he had the package delivered to a vacant house and installed the device on his pistol.
Law enforcement officers have expressed significant concerns about machine gun conversion devices which can be made with a 3D printer using small pieces of metal or plastic. Guns with conversion devices have been used in several mass shootings, including a 2023 shooting at a birthday party in Dadeville, Ala., that killed four young people, and 2022 shooting between rival gangs in Sacramento that left six people dead and 12 others injured
“It takes two or three seconds to put in some of these devices into a firearm to make that firearm into a machine gun instantly,” Steve Dettelbach, director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said in AP’s report on the weapons earlier this year.
Tuskegee University Increased Security Measures for Homecoming
Large crowds were gathered on campus Saturday night to celebrate the school’s centennial homecoming week. Brown said there are no plans to change the school’s homecoming tradition in the future and that protocols were in place to keep students and others safe, CNN reports. The school hired more than 70 additional law enforcement officers from Alabama and Georgia to assist with crowds, according to Montgomery Advertiser. A clear-bag policy was also implemented and weapon-sniffing dogs were deployed.
The university canceled classes Monday and Tuesday and said grief counselors would be available to students. Brown will be hosting town halls for students, faculty and staff to answer questions about the incident.
Effective immediately, Brown said the university is no longer an open campus and an ID is required to enter. Student ID cards must also be worn at all times while on campus and all visitors must wear and display visitor badges throughout their stay.
During a news conference Monday, Brown also said the school fired its security chief following the incident and hired a new one who will conduct an internal review of the shooting. He did not take questions or elaborate on why the security chief was being replaced. Tuskegee University, which is a historically Black university (HBCU), has its own police department with sworn officers that have the same full law enforcement powers and responsibilities under state law as municipal police officers and county sheriffs.
ALEA is asking anyone with information to submit tips at 1-800-CALL-FBI or upload videos or photos at fbi.gov/tuskegeeshooting24.
4 Hurt in 2023 Tuskegee University Shooting
Sunday’s shooting comes just over a year after four people were injured in a shooting at a Tuskegee University student housing complex.
Officials said campus police responded to calls of shots fired at an “unauthorized” party at the school’s West Commons apartment complex around 12:48 a.m. on Sept. 24. Two people visiting campus were shot and two students were hurt trying to leave the scene. One of the shooting victims was treated and released from a local hospital while the other suffered life-threatening injuries.
Following the shooting, some some student’s criticized the school’s security measures.
“My dorm is right next to the front gate. There have been instances where people can just come on campus and there’s no one even sitting in the [gate] check,” said then-freshman Mechel Winters “There’s times when the gate is just open or people can come through the back gate. They really only check for IDs when it’s a football game or when the senator was here last week.”
Winters also criticized the school for referring to the party as “unauthorized.”
“Them saying that the party was unauthorized to kind of switch the blame unto us is crazy because even if it was an authorized party, with the security measures we have in place, the same thing could have happened,” she said.
What Other Campuses Have Recently Experienced Homecoming Shootings?
The Tuskegee incident follows a series of other deadly shootings at homecoming events last month. An Oct. 19 shooting at Albany State University in Georgia left one person dead and several others injured. The same day, three people were killed and eight others were injured after multiple people opened fire into a group of several hundred people who were celebrating the the Holmes County Consolidated School’s homecoming football game win.
Last October, two people were shot during Bowie State University’s homecoming weekend festivities. Five people were also shot just four days prior outside a homecoming event at Morgan State University. The campuses, both in Maryland, are both HBCUs.
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Following the Bowie State shooting, advocates urged that HBCU need more support.
“It just seems that the HBCUs are not getting the resources that they need, and whether it’s fighting over programming with other schools or actually getting funds to handle issues, they’re just not getting it, and that’s problematic,” Randallstown NAACP President Ryan Coleman told WBAL. “This is our best and brightest, and they’re ducking and dodging bullets and glass.”
Overall, predominantly non-White higher education campuses receive significantly less funding than predominantly White ones. However, disproportionate funding starts long before students are old enough to attend higher education institutions. Despite serving the same number of students, predominantly White school districts receive $23 billion more per year funding than predominantly non-White school districts, according to a recent study from EdBuild, an education advocacy group.
