7 people shot at off-campus party during Texas HBCU’s homecoming weekend

Seven people, including a child, were shot Sunday at a packed off-campus party near Prairie View A&M University, a historically Black college in Texas, said the Waller County Sheriff’s Office.

The event, a trail ride pasture party that over a thousand people attended, was hosted during Prairie View A&M’s homecoming weekend, about 2 miles from the university’s campus.

A spokesperson for the university said it’s not known if any of the people who were injured or involved are affiliated with Prairie View A&M University.

“Although this was not an official PVAMU homecoming event and was unaffiliated with the university, our campus community is deeply concerned for those injured and all affected by this incident,” a university spokesperson said.

The incident comes just weeks after five people were injured in a mass shooting at Morgan State University, causing homecoming to be canceled for the first time in the university’s history.

At Prairie View A&M, police were called to the scene shortly after 10 p.m. Sunday and discovered that four adult females, two adult males, and one juvenile male had sustained gunshot wounds to their lower bodies. They had no known life-threatening injuries, the Waller County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement.

The injured people were bystanders to a dispute, which an unknown number of people at the party were involved in, the sheriff’s office said. The statement classifies the incident as aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

Under a local ordinance, the mass gathering, which took place in a field and offered horseback trailer rides, had to be approved. Waller County Judge Trey Duhon, who signed off, said in a statement on Facebook that the ordinance was put in place more than three years ago when similar events held in pastures started becoming an issue. In the most recent incident, a party promoter had attended a hearing on a permit application and agreed to security, noise level, sanitation and fire safety requirements.

“The…