LAKELAND — A year ago, the daily afternoon rhythms of Lakeland’s Midtown community were suddenly interrupted when gunfire rang out on North Iowa Avenue.
On Jan. 30, 2023, five people in a dark blue Nissan sedan opened fire around 3:43 p.m. as they drove along the 900 Block of North Iowa Avenue, barely a half-mile north of downtown.
The street was filled with people, as a school bus had just finished dropping off elementary school students less than a minute earlier. Eyewitnesses said a transportation van from Parker Street Ministries was on site, waiting to take children to its after-school program.
There were 11 people injured in the shooting, two with critical, life-threatening injuries to the jaw and abdomen. All the victims were men between the ages of 20 and 35.
“It’s a blessing not one kid got shot,” resident Tina Smith, who has a 9-year-old daughter, told The Ledger. “They came here for a reason and a purpose, and those bullets had names on them.”
Lakeland police officers arrived on scene within a minute after the first 911 calls came in, Chief Sammy Taylor said. He said it was a “targeted attack” and believed it was Lakeland’s largest mass shooting in at least three decades.