Neighbors react to shooting at neighborhood pool in Columbia
COLUMBIA, S.C. (WIS) - A 17-year-old has been arrested after a shooting erupted at a neighborhood pool in northeast Columbia.
Neighbors said it was a chaotic scene on Tuesday night. Shots were fired and teenagers were seen running across the neighborhood as deputies responded.
Deputies were seen patrolling throughout the area on Wednesday to monitor the community pool.
Tuesday’s shooting was one of many recent shootings at the Villages at Lakeshore neighborhood off Farrow Road.
Just last year, WIS News 10 reported on another shooting at the same pool.
“I don’t even take my grandkids to the pool anymore. It’s not safe,” one neighbor said.
Neighbors said continuous violence in the area has gotten worse, and they fear with school being out, the violence is going to escalate.
“This time it was a lot worse, because this time I was at home,” said resident Chandra Cleveland.
“People were screeching, and hauling, trying to leave out of here,” she said. “Kids were running around crying, and when I say kids, I mean teenagers. Running around crying, because someone was scraped up because everyone was pushing and shoving.”
According to an incident report, deputies received two calls for shots fired around 8 p.m. While in route to the first call, deputies received a second one.
One person had visible wounds on the back of his left arm as well as his back, the report said.
An anonymous neighbor who has been living in the community for around 10 years showed bullet holes near her home and in the side of her house.
She said she remembers this area as being quiet, but within the past three to four years, she said things have changed.
“Kids from the other side of the pond will steal their parents weapons and fire into this neighborhood,” she said.
She believes the increase in violence is at the hands of teens who don’t live in the neighborhood.
But like this neighbor, many others believe the pool area seems to be the epicenter of the violence.
“It doesn’t help when you have parents who don’t live in this community who drop their children off at our pool like it’s a baby sitting center,” one neighbor said
WIS reported on another shooting just two minutes away on Sterling Cove Road. I reached out to the sheriff’s department for an update on that shooting and have not heard back yet.
The investigation is still ongoing and right now and it’s unclear how many people were shooting and what led up to this shooting.
EDITORS NOTE: The sheriff’s department initially said there were four victims in the shooting incident. On Wednesday afternoon, the sheriff’s department said one person was shot on Tuesday evening. Our story reflects this update.
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