Oak Ridge shooting spurs dialogue
Details remain scarce about a shooting that injured 10 people in Oak Ridge on Sunday, May 25, but government officials met with the public to discuss the incident.
“What happened in our community shook us, but it did not break us,” said Anderson County Commissioner Ebony Capshaw, a resident of the historic Scarboro neighborhood where the event occurred. “Never forget that we are Scarboro strong.”
That comment came during a packed community meeting on Tuesday, July 1, more than a month after the shooting.
Multiple festivals and programs, including a parade in Scarboro, took place this summer without incident.
Still, the shooting remains on people’s minds. Authorities have yet to publicly identify suspects.
The incident on South Benedict Avenue injured 10 people — nine shot and one stabbed, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation said.
The TBI is asking anyone with information about the circumstances to call 1-800-TBI-FIND.
The city of Oak Ridge and Oak Valley Baptist Church, where Oak Ridge City Council member Derrick Hammond serves as pastor, organized the July 1 meeting. It was held in a meeting room at the Scarboro Community Center, a building managed by Oak Ridge Recreation and Parks.
At the front of the room were Oak Ridge Police Chief Robin Smith, Anderson County commissioners Anthony Allen and Ebony Capshaw, City Council member Hammond; District Attorney Dave Clark; Oak Ridge City Manager Randy Hemann; and Oak Ridge Mayor Pro Tem James Dodson.
Moderating the meeting was the NAACP’s Phyllis Alexander.
Pastor Henry Watson of Mount Zion Baptist Church opened the meeting with a prayer, thanking God that no one died in the shooting.
Smith said police on the night of Saturday, May 24, heard about a crowd gathering.
The Oak Ridge Police Department began driving through the area to assess the situation, although a smaller crowd had gathered the previous night without incident.
After midnight, Smith said, “A stream of cars started coming into the city.”
Neither Smith nor Clark confirmed whether the shooter was from out of town, although Clark’s May 25 news release stated “many of the attendees apparently came from Knoxville.”
At the meeting, Alexander questioned whether calling the incident a “block party,” as some media outlets did, made sense if those involved were outsiders.
“Suddenly the streets were filled,” Smith said, echoing Clark’s estimation that “the number of people at the event were in the hundreds.”
He said police supervisors did not want to start a confrontation and delayed sending officers into the crowd, instead waiting nearby.
After 3 a.m., they heard gunshots.
Six officers entered the crowd, identified the wounded and placed them in patrol cars, transporting them to where Oak Ridge Fire Department paramedics waited.
“It’s not acceptable for people to be shot in the street in Oak Ridge,” Smith said. “I think we can all agree that we want to be safe. We want to keep our community safe. We want to work together to do that.”
He said that after the incident, his officers examined social media for leads and began regular patrols on foot and by car in Scarboro and elsewhere in Oak Ridge.
Smith and Clark explained that because the TBI is investigating the case, there are limits on what they can share.
“You all want answers,” Clark said. “You deserve answers. But I don’t have the answers, and what I do have I can’t give to you.”
Other questions involved police body cameras. The city has secured state funding for the cameras, but has not yet received the equipment.
“This might end with a semicolon instead of a period,” Alexander said at the start of the meeting.
Hammond similarly said he hoped to hold more meetings like this one going forward.
“This is the beginning of what we can do here,” he said.
A full video of the meeting is available at oakridgetn.gov/308/Livestream.
Part one is at vimeo.com/1096703650 and part two is at vimeo.com/ 1098025171?share=copy.
