Gunmen opened fire on people marching in a neighborhood Mother's Day parade in New Orleans on Sunday, wounding at least 19, the Associated Press reported.
The shooting occurred concurrently with the Mother's Day parade that drew hundreds of people to the 7th Ward neighborhood. There was cell phone video taken in the aftermath of the shooting, which shows victims lying on the ground with blood on the pavement.
At least three of the victims were seriously wounded. Of the rest, many were grazed and authorities said that overall most wounds were not life threatening, news reports said.
The victims included 10 men, seven women, a boy and a girl.
"These kinds of incidents will not go unanswered," Mayor Mitch Landrieu said. "Somebody knows something. The way to stop violence is for you all to help."
"It's strictly an act of street violence," Mary Beth Romig, a spokesman for the FBI in New Orleans said.
Police saw three suspects running from the scene. No arrests had been made as of early evening.
A social club called The Original Big 7 organized Sunday's event. The group was founded in 1996 at the Saint Bernard housing projects, according to its MySpace page.
The neighborhood where the shooting happened is a mix of low-income and middle-class row houses, some boarded up. As of last year, the 7th Ward's population was about 60 percent of its pre-Hurricane Katrina level.
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