NEW ORLEANS — A Mardi Gras parade erupted into chaos on Fat Tuesday when a series of gunshots struck seven people, including a toddler. The child was not seriously injured and two suspects were in custody, police said.
The shootings happened near the Garden District about 1:40 p.m. after the last major parade of the celebration, Rex, had ended.
A stream of truck floats that follow the parade were passing by when gunfire broke out.
“It sounded like a string of fireworks, so I knew it was more than one shooter,” said Toni Labat, 29, a limousine company manager. She was with her two children, a 2-year-old boy and a 10-year-old girl.
“Everybody was petrified. They hit the ground, the floats stopped, everybody on the floats ducked,” Labat said.
Labat said one man dragged himself on the ground screaming for help after being wounded and another man was gasping for air and bleeding from his mouth.
Police spokesman Bob Young said six of the victims — three men ages 50, 33 and 20, two young women ages 20 and 17, and a 15-year-old boy — were taken to area hospitals. Their conditions were not immediately available.
Young said the injured 20-month-old baby was grazed by a bullet and not seriously hurt.
Two men, 19-year-old Mark Brooks and 18-year-old Louis Lazone, both of New Orleans, were each booked on seven counts of attempted first-degree murder. Brooks also faces a charge of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, Young said.
It was not immediately known whether the suspects had attorneys.
Three weapons believed used in the shooting were recovered, Young said. It was not immediately clear whether the gunfire was random or whether the shooters were aiming for the victims or each other.
The violence along the oak-lined Uptown streetcar line marred what had been a generally peaceful day of revelry in which hundreds of thousands of people partied in the streets on the final day of Carnival. Another shooting was reported Friday night after an argument, but otherwise, the event was generally problem-free.
