Things to Know About the Shooting at the KC Chiefs' Super Bowl Celebration
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP/KPR) — Gunfire erupted at the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl celebration, leaving one woman dead and more than 20 people injured, including nine children. The shooting happened at the end of Wednesday's celebration outside the city’s historic Union Station. Fans had lined the parade route and some even climbed trees and street poles or stood on rooftops to watch as players passed by on double-decker buses. Radio station KKFI said via Facebook that Lisa Lopez-Galvan, the host of “Taste of Tejano,” was killed. Police Chief Stacey Graves said Wednesday that three people had been detained and firearms were recovered, but on Thursday police said that one person was determined not to have been involved, leaving two juveniles in custody. Graves says police were still piecing together what happened. She didn't release details about those who were detained or a possible motive.
Gunfire erupted at the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl celebration Wednesday, leaving one woman dead and more than 20 people injured, including children. Shots rang out at the end of the celebration outside the city’s historic Union Station. Fans had lined the parade route and some even climbed trees and street poles or stood on rooftops to watch as players passed by on double-decker buses. The team said all players, coaches and staffers and their families were “safe and accounted for” after the shooting.
Mayor Quinton Lucas, who attended with his wife and mother and ran for safety when shots were fired, said the shooting happened despite the presence of more than 800 police officers in the building and nearby.
Here’s what we know:
THE VICTIMS
Radio station KKFI said via Facebook that Lisa Lopez-Galvan, the host of “Taste of Tejano,” was killed. Lopez-Galvan, whose DJ name was “Lisa G,” was an extrovert and devoted mother of two from a prominent Latino family in the area, said Rosa Izurieta and Martha Ramirez, two childhood friends who worked with her at a staffing company. Izurieta said Lopez-Galvan attended the parade with her husband and her adult son, a die-hard Kansas City sports fan who also was shot. Lopez-Galvan also played at weddings, quinceañeras and an American Legion bar and grill, mixing Tejano, Mexican and Spanish music with R&B and hip hop. Izurieta and Ramirez said Lopez-Galvan’s family is active in the Latino community and her father founded the city’s first mariachi group, Mariachi Mexico, in the 1980s.
Officials at one hospital said of eight gunshot victims they received on Wednesday, two were still in critical condition on Thursday morning and five had been discharged. Of the four people the hospital was treating who had been injured in the chaos after the shooting, three had been discharged.
An official at a second hospital said Thursday that one gunshot victim there remains in critical condition and four people injured in the aftermath of the shooting were treated and released. At a children’s hospital, an official said Wednesday they were treating 12 patients from the celebration, including 11 children between 6 and 15, many with gunshot wounds. All were expected to recover.
THE INVESTIGATION
Kansas City Police Chief Stacey Graves said the department detained three people from the shooting, but on Thursday police announced they had released one person they determined wasn’t involved, leaving two juveniles in custody. Graves said police were still piecing together what happened and did not release details about those who were detained or a possible motive. The FBI and police were asking anyone who had video of the events to submit it to a tip line. It’s not clear how the shooting unfolded, how many people fired guns and whether there was more than one crime scene. Graves said at a news conference Wednesday that she heard that fans may have been involved in tackling a suspect but couldn’t immediately confirm that. A video showed two people chase and tackle a person, holding them down until two police officers arrived.
CITY’S HISTORY
Kansas City has struggled with gun violence, and in 2020 it was among nine cities targeted by the U.S. Justice Department in an effort to crack down on violent crime. In 2023, the city matched its record with 182 homicides, most of which involved guns.Mayor Quinton Lucas has joined with mayors across the country in calling for new laws to reduce gun violence, including mandating universal background checks.
VIOLENCE AT SPORTS CELEBRATIONS
The gun violence at Wednesday’s parade is the latest at a sports celebration in the U.S. to be marred by gun violence, following a shooting that wounded several people last year in Denver after the Nuggets’ NBA championship, and gunfire last year at a parking lot near the Texas Rangers’ World Series championship parade.
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Still No Charges Filed in Parade Shooting Investigation
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCUR) – There are still no charges filed in the shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs Super Bowl parade. KCUR reports that Police Chief Stacey Graves said Thursday that while three people were taken into custody, it was determined that one was not involved. The two who remain in police custody are juveniles. She says the shooting is not connected to terrorism or homegrown violent extremism. “This appeared to be a dispute between several people that ended in gunfire,” she explained. Graves confirmed that one person died – 43-year-old Lisa Lopez-Galvan, a radio D-J and mother of two. Twenty-two people were wounded and half are under 16. Graves said the investigation into the shooting continues. Mayor Quinton Lucas joined Graves at the press conference. He says Wednesday's shooting doesn’t mean an end to parades in Kansas City.
Shooting After Chiefs Super Bowl Parade Seemed to Stem from Dispute Among Several People, Police Say
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The mass shooting that unfolded amid throngs of people at the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl celebration, killing one person and wounding almost two dozen others, appeared to stem from a dispute between several people, authorities said Thursday.
Police Chief Stacey Graves said that the 22 people injured in the shooting ranged between the ages of 8 and 47 years old, half of whom were under the age of 16. A mother of two was killed.
Police said they detained three people from the shooting but released one person they determined wasn't involved, leaving two juveniles in custody. No charges have been filed. Police are looking for others who may have been involved and are calling for witnesses, people with cellphone footage and victims of the violence to call a dedicated hotline.
"We are working to determine the involvement of others. And it should be noted we have recovered several firearms. This incident is still a very active investigation,” Graves said at a news conference.
The shooting outside Union Station occurred despite the presence of more than 800 police officers who were in the building and area, including on top of nearby structures, said Mayor Quinton Lucas, who attended with his wife and mother and ran for safety when the shots rang out. But he doesn't expect to cancel the upcoming St. Patrick’s Day parade.
“We have parades all the time. I don’t think they’ll end. Certainly we recognized the public safety challenges and issues that relate to them,” Lucas said.
People packed the parade route, with fans climbing trees and street poles for a better view. Players rolled through on double-decker buses as DJs and drummers heralded their arrival.
The police chief said 1 million people likely attended the parade, which occurred in a city of about 470,000 people and a metropolitan area of about 2 million, but stressed that the violence was wrought by just a handful of people.
“The law enforcement response was exemplary. Those in attendance also responded," Graves added. “They helped one another and even physically stop a person who was believed to be involved in the incident.”
Meanwhile, police are still asking witnesses to come forward. Many described a sense of confusion that rippled through the crowd.
The rally had just ended and music was still blaring when the shots erupted. Many people initially thought they were hearing fireworks. But then chaos ensued. Some in the crowd hit the ground while others leapt over barriers and sprinted, some carrying children in their arms.
The crowd was so massive that normalcy returned quickly, with some fans unsure what had happened. But then ambulances arrived and officers rushed in with guns drawn. Some of the less seriously injured were driven away on golf carts.
The stunned crowd — some in tears — slowly gathered their belongings, trying to figure out how to get home. Strangers comforted each other as police put up crime scene tape in an area where moments earlier there had been a joyous celebration.
Hank Hunter, a sophomore at a Kansas high school, said he heard shots in the distance while watching the rally with a friend. Initially, they didn’t know what it was, but then “like a chain reaction” people started hitting the ground.
They ran to jump over a barricade and his friend slammed his head into the concrete, Hunter said. A security guard ushered his friend into Union Station, which was closed to the general public, as the players and coaches prepared to leave on buses. There, coach Andy Reid consoled his friend and "just tried to comfort him and calm him down.”
Social media users posted shocking video of police running through Wednesday's crowded scene. One video showed someone apparently performing chest compressions on a victim as another person, seemingly writhing in pain, lay on the ground nearby. People screamed in the background.
Another video showed two people chase and tackle a person, holding them down until two police officers arrived. In an interview Thursday with ABC's “Good Morning America,” Trey Filter of Wichita, Kansas, said he saw someone being chased and took action.
“I couldn’t see much. I heard, ‘Get 'em!’ I saw a flash next to me. And I remember I jumped and remember thinking, ‘I hope this is the fool they were talking about,'" he said. “They started yelling that, ‘There’s a gun! There’s a gun!’"
Filter said he and another man kept the person pinned down until officers arrived. "I remember the officers pulling my feet off of him and at that point I was just looking for my wife and kids,” he said.
It was not immediately clear if the person he held down was involved in the shooting, but Filter's wife, Casey, saw a gun nearby and picked it up.
The woman killed in the shooting was identified by radio station KKFI-FM as Lisa Lopez-Galvan, host of “Taste of Tejano."
Lopez-Galvan, whose DJ name was “Lisa G,” was an extrovert and devoted mother from a prominent Latino family in the area, said Rosa Izurieta and Martha Ramirez, two childhood friends who worked with her at a staffing company.
“She's the type of person who would jump in front of a bullet for anybody — that would be Lisa,” Izurieta said.
Kansas City has long struggled with gun violence, and in 2020 it was among nine cities targeted by the U.S. Justice Department in an effort to crack down on violent crime. In 2023, the city matched a record with 182 homicides, most of which involved guns.
Lucas has joined with mayors across the country in calling for new laws to reduce gun violence, including mandating universal background checks.
Meanwhile, University Health Truman Medical Center reported that three people with gunshot wounds were still being treated there Thursday, including two in critical condition. One is a man who survived only because staff got him to the operating room within five minutes of arrival, Dr. Dustin Neel said.
St. Luke’s Hospital spokesperson Emily Hohenberg said one gunshot victim remains in critical condition there.
Children’s Mercy Kansas City said three children remain there. It had received 11 children between the ages of 6 and 15, nine of whom suffered gunshot wounds. All were expected to recover.
Stephanie Meyer, the hospital's chief nursing officer, said at a Thursday news conference that the kids are scared and will need mental health support. The hospital's staff members are also struggling.
"They’re struggling just like you and I are, and unbelievably heartbroken that this has happened in our backyard," said Dr. Stephanie Burrus, the hospital's chief wellbeing officer. "And we all train for this, we’re all prepared to take care of these children. But it doesn’t negate the fact that it’s still not normal for people to see many, many people wounded by gunshots.”
KC Police Try to Decipher Who Was Behind Mass Shooting at Chiefs' Super Bowl Celebration
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP/KPR) — Authorities in Kansas City are trying to decipher who was behind a mass shooting that unfolded amid throngs of people at the Chiefs’ Super Bowl celebration. Wednesday's violence claimed one woman's life and injured 21 people. The injured include nine children. The woman killed, a mother of two, has been identified as a local DJ Lisa Lopez-Galvan. She was the host of “Taste of Tejano” on KKFI Radio. Lopez-Galvan, whose DJ name was “Lisa G,” was from a prominent Latino family in the area, said Rosa Izurieta and Martha Ramirez, two childhood friends who worked with her at a staffing company. Izurieta said Lopez-Galvan attended the parade with her husband and her adult son, a die-hard Kansas City sports fan who also was shot.
Police said three people were detained and firearms were recovered. But further details on the shooting or a possible motive have not been released. Investigators are calling for witnesses and victims to call a dedicated hotline.
Police Chief Stacey Graves said Wednesday evening that investigators were still piecing together what happened and did not release details about those who were detained or a possible motive. “I’m angry at what happened. The people who came to this celebration should expect a safe environment,” Graves said. The shooting outside Union Station occurred despite the presence of more than 800 police officers who were in the building and nearby, including on top of nearby structures, said Mayor Quinton Lucas, who attended with his wife and mother and ran for safety when the shots rang out. “Parades, rallies, schools, movies. It seems like almost nothing is safe,” Lucas said of the mass shootings continuing to plague the nation.
It's unclear exactly how many people attended the Chiefs' Super Bowl parade but estimates range as high as one million. When the Kansas City Royals won the World Series in 2015, an estimated 800,000 people had flocked to that victory parade, shattering expectations in a city with a population of about 470,000 and a metropolitan area of about 2 million.
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Kansas Attorney General, Law Enforcement, and Victims' Families Call for New Execution Method
TOPEKA, Kan. (KNS) – Law enforcement officials and families of murder victims joined Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach Thursday to call for a new execution method in the state. The Kansas News Service reports that the method, called hypoxia, deprives people of oxygen using nitrogen or other gas until they go unconscious and eventually die. Proponents say hypoxia is more humane than other methods, but critics say it’s cruel and experimental. Lethal injection is currently the only legal form of execution in Kansas, but Kobach says the drugs used in lethal injection are nearly impossible to obtain. "Consequently, in a way, we are lying to the people of Kansas if we say that we have the death penalty but we actually can’t carry out an execution,” he added. However, opponents to the method are also speaking up on the issue. Chuck Weber of the Kansas Catholic Conference said, “...it does not appear to be swift nor humane, based on the very small sample we have right now.” Lethal injection is currently the only legal method of execution in Kansas, where nine inmates are on death row. So far, three states have legalized hypoxia executions. Alabama became the first state to perform a hypoxia execution last month.
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Legislation Would Require Patients to List Reasons for Getting an Abortion in Kansas
WICHITA, Kan. (KNS) – Kansas abortion patients would be required to list and rank their reasons for getting an abortion if proposed legislation becomes law. The Kansas News Service reports that abortion providers already must report certain demographic data to the state, but Mackenzie Haddix with the anti-abortion group Kansans for Life says the bill would help lawmakers craft future policies. “In order to truly address the needs of women in Kansas, we need to know the reasons why women are pursuing abortion so we can offer solutions to help them,” she explained. Abortion rights groups say the bill would force patients to answer invasive and unnecessary questions. They say it could also re-traumatize survivors of sexual assault.
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Legislative Bill Would Create Rating System for Public School Library Books
WICHITA, Kan. (KNS) – Public school libraries in Kansas would have to adopt a rating system for books under a bill proposed by Republican lawmakers. The Kansas News Service reports that the bill would establish a nine-member task force to come up with the rating system. Supporters say it’s needed because local school boards aren’t responding to parent concerns about offensive materials in libraries. Kristy Oborney, a school librarian in Hays, says a rating system would undercut librarians and violate children’s freedom to read. “A rating system would be putting subjective value judgements on literature. So a small group of people would be telling others what they believe a piece of literature would be rated as,” she explained. Texas lawmakers passed a book rating system last year in an effort to keep sexually explicit materials out of school libraries.
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Four-Day School Weeks On the Rise in Kansas; Some Test Scores Drop
WICHITA, Kan. (KNS) – More Kansas schools are switching to four-day school weeks, and their students score lower on some tests. The Kansas News Service reports that new research shows that Kansas students at four-day-a-week schools performed slightly worse than their peers on state assessment tests. They also averaged a point lower on the ACT. Seventy-seven Kansas schools use a four-day week – a 75% increase from a decade ago. Most are in remote parts of the state. State Board of Education member Cathy Hopkins says schools switch to four-day weeks to cut costs and recruit teachers. “Some of them feel like it saved their districts, that they’ve been able to stay, have a school longer. So I think that’s a huge piece when you’re talking very rural Kansas,” she explained. Four-day schedules are on the rise across the region. More than 10% of Missouri public school students attend class only four days a week.
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Kansas Senators Reject Proposal to Cut Public Broadcasting Funds
TOPEKA, Kan. (KNS) – Kansas senators have rejected a proposal to cut funding for public broadcasters in the state. The Kansas News Service reports that both Democrats and Republicans on the Kansas Senate’s budget committee voted against a proposed $50,000 cut to funding for public broadcasters. The 10% cut was proposed by Republican Senator Caryn Tyson in response to a documentary on Kansas public television that she called overly political. Committee members who voted against the cut say public radio and tv provide valuable information to people across the state. Republican Senator Carolyn McGinn says she plans to pursue an additional $200,000 for public broadcasters at a later date.
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House Committee Proposes Out-of-State Permit Refunds After Deer Baiting Rules Dispute
UNDATED (KNS) – A Kansas House committee appears to be following through on a lawmaker’s threat to defund the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks over deer baiting rules. The Kansas News Service reports that the bill would require the wildlife department to provide full refunds to out-of-state hunters if they apply for a deer permit and are not awarded one. The permits are awarded through a lottery that hunters have to pay $200 to enter. Secretary Brad Loveless says refunding those fees to people who don't get a permit would cost the department $7 million a year. “This will have a very, very significant impact on all of our fish and wildlife programs,” he explained. Republican Representative Lewis Bloom, who is on the committee, had threatened the department’s budget for considering a ban on people baiting deer with piles of food.
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Kansas Legislature Considers Statehouse Memorial for Father Emil Kapaun
TOPEKA, Kan. (KNS) – Kansas lawmakers are considering establishing a memorial for Father Emil Kapaun at the Statehouse. The Kansas News Service reports that Kapaun was a Catholic priest from Kansas who served as a chaplain in the U.S. Army. He was captured during the Korean War after refusing to leave wounded soldiers behind. Kapaun provided comfort and spiritual guidance to other prisoners of war for seven months before dying in captivity. He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor in 2013 and is under consideration for sainthood by the Catholic Church. The statue at the Kansas Capitol would be funded through gifts and donations, not public dollars.
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Trial Set for May in Lawsuit over Wichita Police Department Anti-Gang Tactics
WICHITA, Kan. (KNS) – A trial is scheduled for May 7th in a lawsuit against the City of Wichita for the police department’s use of a gang list. The lawsuit alleges the use of the list targets residents of color. It also says that people are added to the list without being notified. The ACLU of Kansas and Kansas Appleseed were granted class action status to represent the more than 5,000 people on the gang list. The trial is expected to last two weeks.
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Alaska Woman Gets 99 Years for Orchestrating "Catfished" Murder-for-Hire Plot in Friend's Death
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — An Anchorage woman has been sentenced to 99 years in prison for orchestrating the death of a developmentally disabled woman in a murder-for-hire plot, hoping to cash in on a $9 million offer from a Midwestern man purporting to be a millionaire.
Denali Dakota Skye Brehmer, 24, was sentenced by Anchorage Superior Court Judge Andrew Peterson earlier this week in the 2019 death of her friend Cynthia Hoffman, whose death was captured in in photos and video near Thunderbird Falls, a popular trail area just north of Anchorage. Brehmer pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in February 2023.
“She may not have pulled the trigger, but this never would have happened it if it weren’t for Denali Brehmer,” Anchorage assistant district attorney Patrick McKay said during sentencing.
Peterson said Hoffman’s pre-mediated murder-for-hire was “tragic and senseless,” and that Brehmer showed no remorse. He said he hoped her sentence would serve as a deterrent to others.
Defense attorneys sought an 80-year sentence with 20 of those years suspended. Alaska does not have the death penalty.
Darin Schilmiller of New Salisbury, Indiana, was also sentenced last month to 99 years in prison for his role in Hoffman’s murder.
Authorities in 2019 said Schilmiller posed online as “Tyler,” a millionaire from Kansas when starting an online relationship with Brehmer. About three weeks before Hoffman was killed, Brehmer and Schilmiller discussed a plan to rape and murder someone in Alaska, according to court documents.
The millionaire’s only demand for payment was either photos or video of the killing.
Brehmer agreed to the offer, and enlisted the help of four friends, Caleb Leyland and Kayden McIntosh, along with two unnamed juveniles.
Leyland will be sentenced in June. McIntosh, whom prosecutors have said was the gunman, will be tried as an adult in the case even though he was 16 when Hoffman was killed. His case is pending trial.
According to court documents, the group took Hoffman to Thunderbird Falls. They went off trail and followed a path to the Eklutna River, where Hoffman was bound with duct tape, shot in the back of the head and thrown into the river. Officials said Brehmer then texted Hoffman’s family to let them know they dropped her off at an Anchorage park.
Brehmer was eventually arrested, and once she realized she had been catfished or tricked by Schilmiller, she told authorities that she had been solicited by him.
Schilmiller admitted to federal agents and the Indiana State Police that he chose Hoffman as the victim and told Brehmer to kill her, court documents said.
He said Brehmer communicated with him throughout Hoffman’s killing and sent Snapchat photos and videos of Hoffman while bound and after she was killed.
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