Man charged in connection to mass shooting at Oakland Juneteenth celebration

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — A 23-year-old Oakland man has been charged in connection with a mass shooting that broke out at a Juneteenth celebration in the San Francisco Bay Area last month.

Prosecutors charged JaJuan Kelly, 23, with four counts of felony assault with a semiautomatic firearm for the shooting of four people at the Oakland event, the Alameda County district attorney’s office said in a statement Wednesday.

Authorities are looking for multiple suspects, and District Attorney Pamela Price said she was “deeply relieved to announce that one of the individuals” has been charged.

Kelly was one of 14 people shot and wounded June 19 at an unsanctioned sideshow following a peaceful celebration attended by thousands. No one was killed, and those injured ranged from 20 to 30 years old. Police initially said 15 people had been shot, but later revised the figure.

Ernie Castillo, an attorney for Kelly, said Wednesday it could be a case of self-defense, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

June 19, or Juneteenth, marks the day in 1865 enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, found out they had been freed — after the end of the Civil War, and two years after President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation.

Juneteenth was designated a federal holiday in 2021 and has become more universally recognized beyond Black America.