Seven people are dead, including the suspected gunman, after a shooting at a Colorado Springs, Colorado, birthday party, police said Sunday.
Authorities responded to a shooting call at a mobile home park early Sunday and found six adults dead and one man seriously injured. The man later died at the hospital, the Colorado Springs Police Department said in a news release.
Police said children at the trailer were not hurt and are now with relatives.
The suspected shooter was the boyfriend of a female victim at the party attended by friends, family, and children. He walked inside and began shooting beforedying by suicide, police said.
The neighborhood, lined with mobile homes with big yards, is usually quiet, the Denver Post reported.
Neighbor Yenifer Reyes told the paper that she awoke early Sunday to the sound of many gunshots.
“I thought it was a thunderstorm,” she said. “Then I started hearing sirens.”
She said that police brought children out of the trailer, putting them into at least one patrol car.
“They were crying hysterically,” she said.
Freddy Marquez told the Denver Post that he had attended the party and all the victims were members of the same extended family who were celebrating the birthdays of Marquez's wife and her brother.
He said that his family had left early because his wife had to work early the next morning. His wife woke up around 4 a.m. to get ready for work and saw all her missed calls.
She lost her mother and two brothers in the shooting.
“It’s just crazy, it’s not what we expected on Mother’s Day,” Marquez said. “I’m at a loss for words.”
In an initial report, police said the shooter knew the victims.Police have not released their names and saidthey are still investigating a motive.
“Today we find ourselves mourning the loss of lives and praying solemnly for those who were injured and those who lost family members in a senseless act of violence on Sunday morning," Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers said in a statement.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis said on Twitter that the shooting was "devastating, especially as many of us are spending the day celebrating the women in our lives who have made us the people we are today.”
Police Chief Vince Niski said in a statement that his "heart breaks for the families who have lost someone they love and for the children who have lost their parents" in the shooting.
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"When these types of unspeakable acts happen, there is nothing that can be done to fully rebuild what was lost or replace those who are no longer with us," he said. "My vow to this community and to the families who have lost someone today, is that this department will do everything we can to find you the answers you deserve and be here for you with an unwavering support.”
Colorado Springs is about 70 miles south of Denver. It is Colorado's second-biggest city, behind Denver.
The shooting marks Colorado's worst mass shooting since a gunman killed 10 people at a Boulder supermarket in March.
Colorado had the sixth-highest rate of public mass killings out of the 50 states in a database compiled in March by USA TODAY, Northeastern University and The Associated Press.
In 2015, a man shot three people to death at random before dying in a shootout with police in Colorado Springs on Halloween. At a Planned Parenthood clinic in the city just a month later, a man killed three people and injured eight others.
At a movie theater in Aurora in 2012, a gunman killed 12 and injured 58.
In 1999 at Columbine High School, two students killed 12 others and a teacher before dying by suicide.
Contributing: The Associated Press
