Investigators works the scene of a shooting in Fairfield Township, N.J., Sunday, May 23, 2021. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

By Geoff Mulvihill, AP

A family house party in South Jersey turned into a crime scene where at least two people were fatally shot and 12 others were wounded, state police said.

Authorities arrived at the house in Fairfield Township, about an hour outside of Philadelphia, late Saturday night. A resident who runs a local anti-violence organization said he was called out to assist families at the 90s-themed party. John Fuqua, of Life Worth Living, said guests who attended the party were of all ages.

New Jersey State police said a 30-year-old man and 25-year-old-woman were fatally shot. There were 12 other people who were injured and transported to local hospitals.

No arrests have been made.

Photos show overturned pop-up party tents, tables and chairs, and debris throughout the home’s yard. A long driveway was still filled with cars late Sunday morning.

Two cousins who live in the area of the shooting said they heard music from the party until after midnight, then a series of shots — at least 15 of them over a few minutes.

Joeron Pierce and James Pierce, who live in homes next to each other, said that there was chaos after that. Partygoers ran through their yards and asked to come into their houses. They said cars ran into one other trying to speed away.

Fairfield Township Mayor Benjamin Byrd Sr., who was at the scene Sunday, said that New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy offered his support and help.

Investigators works the scene of a shooting in Fairfield Township, N.J., Sunday, May 23, 2021. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

“Nobody knows when someone’s going to come out of the woods with a gun,” Byrd said. He did not have any details about the shooting.

Murphy called the shooting “horrific.”

“This despicable and cowardly act of gun violence only steels our commitment to ensuring New Jersey leads the nation in passing and enforcing strong and commonsense gun safety laws,” Murphy said in a statement. “No community should ever experience what occurred last night in Fairfield.”

WPVI-TV reported that the reverend of a nearby church heard the gunfire.

“I just started hearing at first what I thought was fireworks, it was really gunshots, and I heard nine in rapid succession,” said the Rev. Michael Keene of the Trinity AME Church.

Messages seeking additional information have been left with multiple organizations.

State police scheduled a press conference for Monday morning.

UPDATE:

Police have announced that a suspect has been arrested.

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72 COMMENTS

  2. my pal from jersey says everyone has aluminum bats. he couldn’t have a slingshot (?) and it was illegal to fight praying mantids (slightly easier to pluralize).

  3. Phil Smurfy is already saying NJ needs stricter gun laws to prevent this from happening. In a state with the strictest gun laws in the nation who wants to bet the perp was already breaking existing laws on the books and more laws would not have prevented this?

  4. “This despicable and cowardly act of violence against helpless innocents only steels our commitment to ensuring New Jersey leads the nation in keeping innocents helpless,” Murphy said.

    • It’s only about that when a republican isn’t in office, unless the Dem is black of course… Then they just feeds the trolls.

  6. Meanwhile, Carol Bowne is still dead, thanks to the steely commitments of Murphy’s predecessors.

  7. The problem isn’t guns or a lack of gun laws. The problem is the community that has abdicated its responsibility to hold criminals accountable because most of the people in the community are criminals.

    Think of it as evolution in action.

  8. …. ” Nobody knows when somebody’s going to come out of the woods with a gun ” says the township’s mayor. Oh, I guess he was intimating the shooter was a hillbilly white supremest – the area is overrun with them. Oops, turns out that the suspect, Kevin Dawkins is black, and a felon. Oops again, guess the five gazillion gun laws Joyzee already has didn’t cover that ? This story will disappear before the five o’clock news

    • No, he said that because the shooter in this particular mass shooting fired the shots FROM THE WOODS, so it was an accurate statement. Because the shooter was shooting from the woods, it makes sense that they were warning that the shooter was “going to come out of the woods with a gun.” I live in New Jersey, so I’ve been following this story closely.

      • Apparently not closely enough. Gang bangers. Wealthy ones, not that that is unusual but gang bangers none the less.

      • Stuck in New Jersey,

        The grim cautionary statement about the possibility of someone coming out of the woods with a firearm to harm people–and thus implying that firearms are the crux of the danger–is laughable.

        A spree-killer scumbag could sneak through the woods and accomplish a likely far more deadly result with nothing more than simple archery equipment. All that he/she would have to do is set up on the edge of the woods with a recurve bow and four arrows tipped with broadheads. That person could easily shoot all four arrows indiscriminately into a crowd in 8 seconds. Sadly, each arrow could easily pass through one or two people (depending on where they hit) and deliver fatal wounds to two or three people leading to a death toll as high as 12. The fact that there would be absolutely no sound, concussion, nor impact would tend to guarantee that no one in the crowd would react until it was too late.

        The truth of the matter is that human depravity is the core problem.

        • You have been watching FOR YOUR EYES ONLY or RAMBO again.

          How about a match and a can of gasoline?

        • Tell you what, I am still not together with exactly what we are talking about with a crowd of 700 attending a “house party” in the Jersey woods. What was this “party” supposedly about?

  9. “This despicable and cowardly act of gun violence only steels our commitment to ensuring New Jersey leads the nation in passing and enforcing strong and commonsense gun safety laws,” Murphy said in a statement.

    FTFY

    • No, the shooter in this particular shooting fired the shots from the woods, so it wasn’t a “drive-by shooting” unless deer are now armed.

      Did you even bother to click on the photo of the house? This was a multi-million-dollar house in a wealthy suburb, so GTFO with your bigoted crap about “the area’s street gang scum.” In other states, that might be only a $600,000 house, but here in New Jersey, houses like that cost millions! GFTO with your bigoted “area’s street gang scum” language when talking about multi-million-dollar houses in wealthy suburbs! Much as I hate living in New Jersey, there are some nice places here, although you have to have millions of dollars to afford a house like the one where the shooting occurred.

      I’m guessing that one of the wealthy neighbors didn’t like the loud music after midnight, so rather than filling a noise complaint and waiting an hour for police to show up, they took matters into their own hands. See where the article said, “Two cousins who live in the area of the shooting said they heard music from the party until after midnight, then a series of shots.”

      • Did you ever hear of AIR-B&B house rental?
        It is very common for low income people to rent a big ass house for the weekend so that they can have a party.

      • A lot of drug dealers/gang members live in million dollar houses so what’s your point?

      • Wait a minute, you’ve got to get with the program!

        There is no gun violence that happens in wealthy suburbs, it only happens in poor neighborhoods where lazy, no good drug dealers shoot each other every day.

        • There’s no such thing as ‘gun violence’. Another made up term fascists use to put the screws to everyman.

        • “I agree…Tossing skin color into the conversation are signs of stupidity and a knucklehead who is prone to become a b*tch for some sneaky white perp.“

          I’d agree as well, it is interesting that someone would call me racist plantation owner when I didn’t mention race in my post.

          Gee, I wonder who it was that posted under that fraudulent handle?
          Oh, look at that avatar, where have we seen that before? Darn it, another attempt at anonymity failed, just like all your other endeavors. Loser.

        • Maybe you should look at this guy’s priors, and where he came from. Also, the homies he targeted.

        • Anybody note that the despicable assumptions about skin color were, as usual, correct? Did that boy look like an upstanding young millionaire to you? Screaming and yelling about something which would be OBVIOUS to anyone paying attention makes you look like a fool. Some kind of crazy “party” attracted too many different drug dealing gangs, and they settled their differences in the normal way, likely convincing the only caucasians involved to never rent out their million dollar home again.

      • Rifle pistol or shotgun……..or unknown thus far? This is a bit more of an unusual setting.

      • I agree…Tossing skin color into the conversation are signs of stupidity and a knucklehead who is prone to become a b*tch for some sneaky white perp.

        • 13/50 and the shooter was black in an area with very few blacks. Not tossing race in would be a sign of stupidity.

        • cloudbuster…if you want to see stupidity that defines stupidity look in a mirror.

  11. From NJ 101.5.

    “Kevin K. Dawkins, 36, Bridgeton, was charged with unlawful possession of a weapon, unlawful possession of a large capacity magazine and possession of a weapon for unlawful purpose. He is being held in the Cumberland County Jail.”

    “A female guest at the party told the New York Post the shooting may be connected to “two local rival factions of young men” in a rivalry that dates back to the 1960s.”

    Suspect is Black. Multiple violent felony convictions on his record. Gangbanger.

    Phil Murphy can f*** himself.

    • “… in a rivalry that dates back to the 1960s.”

      Holy crap. 2 generations back…

      • In gang generations could be as many as 3 or 4 as most don’t tend to have long lives.

        • Or to wait very long before starting “families” to be funded by taxpayers, how much school do you need to be a baby momma?

  13. “Local rival factions” has to be the best euphemism I’ve heard in some time.
    It beats using “auto recycling center” instead of “junkyard”.

    • Ho hum…thats a slow night in Chiraq. 14 shot in south Carolina. 1 dead kid. Only Joizee makes the newz.

    • There’s no way you’d ever find me or any of the people that I know that would be caught within a mile of a party that had hundreds of ” guests” in attendance. I avoid gatherings where there are more than about 20 people at… you can expect some sort of throwdown to break out when the booze and other shit starts flowing. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that Prime Minister Kequing of China is challenging King Dribblecup to a demolition derby between both country’s Mars rovers as I type this.

      • King Dribblecup, every time I read that I laugh.
        Cool demos on Mars, to bad covid limits the audiance

      • That’s odd, I’ve had gatherings where the number of attendees far exceeded 20, and everyone left with the same number of holes they arrived with.

    • Among charges against Dawson, Fox News lists ” certain person not to have a weapon”…. sounds way better than the non-p.c. / unwoke version ” felon in possession “, doesn’t it ??

  14. 13% of the population does well over half the crime in America & when it comes to gun crimes, they do it on their own people, so that’s not so bad , but now they want to regulate everyone else BUT the culprits. In fact the politicians want to let the ones they caught out of prison & give them pats on the back for being misunderstood.
    And Jersey sucks anyway.

  15. If I had some pellets for my pellet gunm there’s a squirrel out there I could shoot. Nobody would know it, it’s got a white belly, them are the tender ones. I’ve got a bunch of Wthrby .300’s bullets but that might attract attention.

    • Phew, cartridges for that rifle gotta be pricey. I’m all for a squirrel fricassee, but get yourself a footlong chilidog at the DQ and save some coin.

  17. They called a fucken social justice warrior to assist. Lmfao.

    National news coverage, until the truth leaked. Guns are already heavily regulated in NJ, so your agenda has failed.

    This shit is the definition of beating a dead horse. They’ve managed to turn that horse to mulch from bludgeoning it into a sinkhole beyond the ground where it once lied.

    • Yeah, I see the same thing coming in San Jose, big ass shoot’emup, let’s pass us some common sense. Yo, doofus, CA ALREADY has massive quantities really, really stupid gun control, in addition to massive quantities stupid Federal gun control, did absolutely nothing to prevent this shoot’emup, why would anybody think additional unenforced laws will be the answer? Might wanna wait until someplace like Vermont has a mass shoot’emup before claiming more common sense is needed.

  18. Let’s state the obvious, this could have happened anywhere, that it happened in N.J. just re-enforces the fact “More gun laws doesn’t mean less crime”, but queue the gun control nuts in 3,2,1…

    • I bet it turns out he’s just really tan from his job as a lifeguard while he works on his Ph.D.

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