Police target citywide paintball battle

Police target citywide paintball battle

DETROIT

Stepped-up police enforcement is planned this weekend in Detroit to quell a social media-publicized citywide paintball war that – so far – has resulted in six arrests and left an unmarked patrol car splattered.

Chief James Craig referred Friday to the running battle along city streets as “Paint Up, Guns Down,” and said organizers are pitching it as an alternative to gun and other violence.

“If you want to work with us and stop the violence, there are a number of things we can do together, but having paintball wars across the city is not the way to do it,” said Craig said during a news conference.

On Wednesday night, Davon Williams, 22, was arrested when nearly a dozen paintballs struck Capt. Darrell Patterson’s vehicle. The paintballs rained on the unmarked car after Patterson turned on its emergency lights when he saw about 50 people with paintball guns shooting at each other.

After refinery fire, city back to normal

SUPERIOR, WIS.

Authorities said Friday they believe there’s no further danger to the public in northwestern Wisconsin after an oil refinery explosion injured at least 13 people and sent billowing plumes of black smoke into the air.

Superior Mayor Jim Paine said at a news conference that his community was getting back to normal after Thursday’s explosion and fire at the Husky Energy refinery. Authorities lifted an evacuation for Superior order just before 6 a.m., allowing residents to return to their homes and jobs in the Lake Superior port city of 27,000 people.

Refinery manager Kollin Schade said six injured workers were taken to hospitals and seven others were treated at the scene after Thursday’s explosion.

Crowds pay respect to shooting victim

GALLATIN, Tenn.

Hundreds of people thronged a Tennessee church Friday, some hugging and crying, as they paid their respects for a college student killed in the weekend shooting rampage at a Waffle House.

The line of mourners waiting to give their condolences to the family of DeEbony Groves, 21, was so long that it snaked outside the First Baptist Church in Gallatin.

Groves and three others were killed Sunday by a gunman who opened fire outside the restaurant with an AR-15 rifle and then stormed the restaurant. Also killed was Akilah DaSilva, a 23-year-old rap artist from Antioch, Joe Perez, a 20-year-old who lived in Nashville and Taurean Sanderlin, a 29-year-old employee at the restaurant. Four people were injured.

Travis Reinking, 29, has been arrested and charged in connection with the shooting. He is facing multiple charges, including four counts of criminal homicide.

7 students killed in knife attack in China

BEIJING

Seven students were killed Friday in a stabbing rampage at a middle school in China’s northwest, authorities said.

State broadcaster CCTV said the attack happened in Shaanxi province’s Mizhi county as students were leaving the No. 3 Middle School. It said 12 other students were injured.

A suspect identified by the surname Zhao has been arrested, it said.

China tightly restricts private gun ownership, making knives and homemade explosives the most common weapons employed in violent crimes.

No information was given as to a motive, although reports on Chinese social media said the suspect had once been a pupil at the school.

Associated Press