Douglas John Kantor id as Sixth St Austin mass shooting fatal victim after 14 innocent bystanders are caught in crossfire. Authorities arrest juvenile as second suspect sought.
A 25 year-old IT worker from NYC has died after he was one of 14 people shot during Saturday’s mass shooting along 6th st in Austin, Texas as revellers were caught in crossfire in the early hours of Saturday.
Douglas John Kantor, 25, was hospitalized with critical gunshot wounds and died 36 hours later on Sunday at 12:01 pm according to a press release from The Austin Police Department.
A juvenile was arrested in connection with the shooting, with police searching for a second suspect. It remained unclear what charges the teen boy would face.
Twelve victims remained in stable condition while the condition of a second person who was critically wounded remained unclear Monday.
In a released statement, the victim’s brother revealed that Kantor ‘suffered from the time of the injury until the time of death. He was shot through the abdomen just below the rib cage, straight through,’ brother Nick Kanton told KXAN.
Dispute between two parties led to gunfire
‘He suffered from the time of the injury until the time of death, it was the most gruesome thing I could think to wish on someone.
‘It’s painful to discuss, but I think the public deserves to know that my brother suffered.’
Interim Police Chief Joseph Chacon said the shooting happened around 1:30 a.m. Saturday on a street packed with bars and barricaded off from vehicle traffic. He said investigators believe the shooting began as a dispute between two parties.
The mass shooting – one of at least three in the U.S. overnight Saturday – sparked panic along 6th Street, a popular nightlife destination in Austin.
Kantor’s family released a statement in the wake of his death, saying that he had been looking forward to marrying his high school sweetheart of 10 years, Adrianna Esposito, and starting a family.
‘He was loved by all who knew him and had an infectious smile that would light up any room. He was loved by his family, friends and everyone who met him,’ the statement read.
Kantor was originally from Airmont, New York and had been living in Michigan.
There was a mass shooting overnight in an entertainment district of Austin, Texas. 13 were injured. One suspect, described by police as a slim black male with dreadlocks, escaped the scene. pic.twitter.com/g7nbVlg7uB
— Andy Ngô (@MrAndyNgo) June 12, 2021
Unrelenting gun violence & mass shootings in the US
He received his bachelors degree in computer engineering from Michigan State University and had been working at Ford Motor Company at the time of his death.
‘He motivated everyone he came in contact with, was a team player and advanced quickly in the IT department at Ford working as a product manager…
‘This senseless tragedy has put an end to all his dreams,’ the statement read.
The weekend gun violence comes amid a spike in U.S. shootings and homicides eclipsing those of pre pandemic rates amid a rise in gun ownership and debate over policing and ongoing discord within the US seemingly mirroring the widest socio-economic polarities in over 50 years.
The Gun Violence Archive, which defines mass shootings as those involving four or more people who were shot, regardless of whether they died. Overall, according to its database, more than 8,700 people have died of gun violence in the U.S. this year.
The GVA also found that mass shootings spiked in 2020 to about 600, which was higher than in any of the previous six years it tracked the statistic. According to this year’s count, there have been at least 267 mass shootings in the U.S. so far.
