Colorado Springs mourns LGBT nightclub shooting: ‘Another nightmare’

The area around Club Q in Colorado Springs has been cordoned off with yellow police tape. The clothes are scattered on the asphalt, some with traces of blood. A memorial spot has been set up just outside the tapes, a cardboard sign reads “love over hateThe mourners fall into each other’s arms weeping.

In the LHBTI nightclub it took place on the night from Saturday to Sunday a massacre Place. Around midnight, a 22-year-old man entered the nightclub where a crowd was dancing at the time. The shooter wore a bulletproof vest. As soon as he entered, he opened fire. With a semi-automatic weapon he shot the cheering visitors.

“I heard four or five shots. At first I thought it was the music and just kept dancing,” says Joshua Thurman. He was at the club to celebrate his birthday. He is now talking to journalists, near the place where yesterday he heard the shots.

“I heard more shots and then I saw a flash coming from the barrel of a gun,” he says. He fled to a locker room. Later, when he came out again, he saw bodies lying on the ground. “Broken glass, blood. I’ve lost friends.”

Five people were killed in the attack. 22 people were injured, two of whom are in critical condition. Bystanders managed to overwhelm the shooter. The mayor of Colorado Springs calls them heroes. “Their actions have saved lives.”

Six minutes after 911 received a report of the shooting, police were at the scene. The perpetrator was arrested and is currently under house arrest. Nothing is known yet of his motive, currently under investigation by the police in collaboration with the FBI. For Club Q, which is about a hate crimeit is already clear: it was a targeted attack on the LGBTI community.

The club was to host an event in honor of this morning Transgender Day of Remembrance, a day dedicated to the remembrance of people who have lost their lives to anti-transgender violence. Brunch was announced and there would be a party “to celebrate a variety of gender identities,” according to the club’s Facebook page.

Instead, attendees now remember the victims of yet another LGBTI club shooting. In 2016, a gunman killed 49 people at an Orlando queer club, injuring 53 people. That was the second deadliest mass shooting in American history.

“It’s like living another nightmare” to say Tiara Kelley vs The New York Times. Kelly hosts a weekly drag show at Club Q. “Dealing with it isn’t easier the second time around. It could be even worse.”

Thurman, the man who danced during the shooting, calls Club Q a “safe haven” for visitors. “This is a place where we love, a place of peace, a place to be ourselves.”

“Something like one mass shooting in a safe place for LGBTI people, it causes incredible damage,” another club visitor told the American news channel Cnn. “It produces feelings of disrespect, disbelief and sheer shock.”

An eyewitness tells his story:

“Places that are supposed to be safe spaces for acceptance and celebration should never turn into places of terror and hatred,” President Joe Biden said in a statement. a press release. “And yet it happens too often. We must eliminate the inequalities that contribute to violence against LGBTI people, we cannot and must not tolerate hatred”.

In his statement, Biden reiterates his call for a federal ban on assault weapons. “When do we decide we’ve had enough?”

Other politicians are also shocked by the shooting. “It is horrific and unacceptable to see hatred against LGBTI people grow in our communities,” she said. writes Hillary Clinton on Twitter.

Republican Congresswoman Lauren Boebert, an outspoken gun rights advocate, called the shooting “absolutely appalling.” “I pray for the victims and their families”, she writes.

The shooter so far is only known to be 22 years old, police have also released the suspect’s name: Anderson Lee Aldrich. The man is unknown to the owners of Club Q.

According to the New York Times, the shooter had already come into contact with police when he threatened to attack his mother with a homemade bomb last year. The newspaper writes that a man with the same name and age as the shooter was arrested at Club Q, also in Colorado Springs.

Police have not confirmed that it is the same man.