At around 11:10 p.m. Monday, Sept. 23, two cars were seen firing gunshots at each other in Liberty, Missouri. No injuries occurred, but one home was struck by the fire through the front door and several rooms throughout the house.
The rolling gun battle, as many news outlets are calling it, happened on the 600 block of Camelot Drive. This is 2.4 miles away from William Jewell College, a nine minute drive, and is located by Bennett Park.
Jewell’s very own celebrated basketball coach, Larry Holley, heard the gunshots from his living room with his wife.
“I thought it was fireworks,” said Holley. “I was delayed about 20-25 seconds, I got up and looked out to the cul-de-sac and there was nothing there so went back and sit down and watched TV.”
The police later showed up at Holley’s door to ask questions about the incident. Police currently do not have any leads and have been asking people on Camelot Drive to send in any video footage that may have been captured by home security cameras, or Ring doorbell devices which film as well.
The spokesperson for the Liberty Police Department, Captain Andy Hendrick, says that the footage will “Help us identify who were in those cars and license plates and makes and models.”
What does this mean for students at Jewell? With a shooting so close to campus, the safety of the area is brought into question.
Liberty’s crime index states that the city is safer than 34 percent of others in the United States. With a population of 31,507, there is a violent crime rate of 2.32 per 1000 residents. In the last five years, Liberty’s violent crime rate has increased.
The chances of one of Jewell’s students becoming a victim of a violent crime is 1-432. However, no other recent shootings have been reported this close to campus. It is now a waiting game to see if the Liberty police find out the perpetrators of this recent gunfight.