Six Wounded in Florida Family Feud (Not good for us)

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Desertdog

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This will probably be used as a weapon against HONEST gun owners. We don't need these kind of stories. :banghead:

Six Wounded in Florida Family Feud
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-family-feud,0,3898162.story

By Associated Press

April 11, 2005, 12:23 PM EDT


CRESCENT CITY, Fla. -- Members of neighboring families shot at each other, wounding six people, as part of a long-running feud that victims said peaked when a girl from one family began dating a boy from the other one.

Six people ages 14 to 22 were taken to hospitals Sunday for treatment of gunshot wounds. Two remained hospitalized Monday, one in serious condition.

Baldemar Riojas, 46, was charged with six counts of aggravated battery with a firearm. He was freed on $15,000 bail.

Members of the Soliz and Ortiz families say their feud with the neighboring Riojas family has simmered for more than a year and became more heated when Riojas' teenage daughter started dating Miguel Soliz, 15, who was among the wounded.

"All this started because they were dating," said Melva Ortiz, Miguel's mother. "I tried to tell him to leave the girl, but you know how kids are."

Maj. Rick Ryan of the Putnam County sheriff's office said members of both families had guns and fired across a street at each other.

However, he said investigators had been stymied by the families' reluctance to talk to authorities. "We get out there and nobody knows anything," Ryan said.

Angelica Soliz, a cousin of the victims, said she hid under a bed during the gunfire early Sunday.

"We just threw ourselves to the floor, and the people who got shot, they didn't have a chance," said another family member, Maria Ortiz, 22.

The violence had been building for hours. A fight broke out Saturday night among dozens of opposing family members, but the sheriff's office said there was not enough information for an arrest.

Riojas' 20-year-old son, Baldomero Riojas, was questioned and released, but Putnam County sheriff's deputies plan to pursue a charge of reckless display of a firearm against him for allegedly firing into the air. A third man was being sought.

Riojas' wife said her husband was not responsible.

"My husband's not a violent person. He's been in the United States for 24 years and he's never been in trouble," Lisa Riojas told WJXT-TV of Jacksonville.

Ana Diaz, 14, who was wounded in the back, was in serious but stable condition Monday at Hallifax Medical Center in Daytona Beach. The only other person hospitalized, Miguel Ortiz, 22, was in good condition at Shands Hospital in Gainesville.
 
Weird mix of Romeo and Juliet and the Hatfield/McCoy fued. Fun stuff.

Soliz and Ortiz families say their feud with the neighboring Riojas family...

Wonder if they were "undocumented immigrants."

Riojas' wife said her husband was not responsible.

LOL.. that's an understatement.
 
We don't need these kind of stories.

No, but at some point you just have to resign yourself to the fact that there always has been and always will be a certain percentage of any population that is a few nucleotides short of a sequence.
 
Close to home

I live in the county this happened about 20 min. from this small town. While gunowners dont need bad publicity, I haven't heard anything in the media trying to make this a gun control issue. To respond to some in this thread, I wish we would not fall prey to stereotypes such as the hispanic sounding names meaning "undocumented" immigrants or this thing happening quite regularly because this is the south. Florida is different from the rest of the south because we have almost just as many people from up north(myself included) as there is the native population. Lets try to keep the message about debunking gun control myths and uniting common sense thinking people behind gun ownership rights without falling prey to stereotyping ourselves.
 
Ben, they only make it a gfun control story on the national level. Down there its just a trash shot trash story.
 
The only reason this made the national news is that 6 people were shot. This sort of thing happens all the time on a smaller scale, many times even nastier. Just doesn't have the numbers the media can quote with a shocked look on their faces, so you don't hear about it.
 
I understand the concern about the national implications but i have followed the news coverage and it hasn't made fox or cnn at least not yet anyways and it happened saturday night. I understand that in any shooting incident the anti's will try to turn it against us. I was just saying we ought not make this an ethnic or geographical stereotype issue because these situations happen regardless of any of those facts. I do not mean to flame just don't want our message to be trivialized by falling prey to using stereotypes ourselves.
 
I understand Ben. I hope that you understand that my use of "trash" was in the long held southerntradition, and in no way reflects on gender, race, etc. These folks are criminals, plain and simple. They have no regard for the law or the fact they might have hurt people who werem't even involved.
 
I appreciate your response bear gulch and had no problem with your trash comments lol because indeed trash comes in all shapes, sizes and colors.
 
Montagues and Capulets.

Yawn.

I do hope that no bystanders felt endangered.

Thinking again, yep, it is a serious, rowdy breach of the peace, and I hope that the Govt. folks were more effectual in shutting it down than the ones in Bill S's play!
 
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