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A driver rammed a vehicle into participants during the pride parade, killing one person and injuring the other.
The head of the men’s choir stated that at the beginning of the Pride Parade in South Florida on Saturday, a member of the men’s choir accidentally rammed a pickup truck against other choir members, causing the group to become a member of the group. One member died and another member was seriously injured, correcting the initial guess that it was a hate crime against the gay community.
The incident took place at the beginning of the Wilton Manor Stonewall Pride Parade and the festival, which was an LGBTQ celebration in a small town near Fort Lauderdale.
Local 10 News said the white pickup truck lined up with other floats for the parade before accelerating and hitting a pedestrian.
Wilton Manors Deputy Mayor Paul Rolli and Fort Lauderdale Mayor Dean Trantalis said on Sunday that early investigations indicated that this was an accident.
The 77-year-old driver has been detained, but the police said that no charges have been filed and the investigation is still ongoing.
Raleigh told the Associated Press in a telephone interview: “The early investigation now shows that this looks like a tragic accident, but in the end no one said what it was.”
The driver and the victim were members of the Fort Lauderdale Gay Men’s Choir, which consisted of 25 members, mainly older men.
“Our choir members are all injured, and the driver is also a member of the choir family. As far as I know, this is not an attack on the LGBTQ community,” President Justin Knight said in a statement on Sunday. This is an “unfortunate accident”.
Raleigh sat with Fort Lauderdale Mayor Dean Trantalis and other city officials on the float in front of the chorus truck in the assembly area where the float was ready.
Trantalis said that when the driver of a pickup truck was told that he was the next one in the parade, he suddenly accelerated and crashed into the victim. Police said the driver continued to cross all lanes and eventually hit the fence on the other side of the street.
“People are really upset, some people are crying,” said Raleigh, who explained that the crash happened in a line of floats, so there were not many people in the parade.
Fort Lauderdale police said that no one has been arrested and they are conducting a thorough investigation with the FBI and stated in a statement that they are “considering and evaluating all possibilities.”
Fort Lauderdale’s first mayor to publicly open homosexuality, Trantalis, initially told reporters that the behavior was deliberate and aggravated the chaos on Saturday night.
“It makes me and the people around me feel terrified… I worry that this may be deliberate that I saw from a few feet away,” he said in a Twitter statement on Sunday.
“As the facts continue to be pieced together, a scene of an accident involving a truck out of control is emerging.”
Flowers were scattered on the scene, and a driver crashed into the audience at the beginning of the Pride Parade, killing one person and seriously injuring the other [Lynne Sladky/AP Photo]
Wilton Manor is a closely connected community near Fort Lauderdale. The photos and videos at the scene showed that U.S. Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz was driving a convertible in tears during the military parade.
In a statement on Saturday night, Wasserman Schultz said she was safe, but “deeply shocked and shocked by the passing of a life.”
“I feel very sad about what happened during this celebration,” she said. “May the memory of the lost life be for blessings.”
June is Pride Month, commemorating the June 1969 uprising, when police raided gay customers at the Stonewall Hotel in New York. This is a catalyst for the gay rights movement.
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