Multiple people wounded in shooting near Birmingham's Legion Field after Magic City Classic, police say
Birmingham police say multiple people were wounded by gunfire near Legion Field on Saturday evening after the Magic City Classic, suspending all tailgating and asking witnesses to share video with investigators.
Multiple people were wounded in a shooting near Legion Field in Birmingham, Alabama, on Saturday evening, shortly after the annual Magic City Classic football game ended, Birmingham police have confirmed. The gunfire turned a day of celebration for two historically Black universities into a crime scene, with emergency crews treating victims on streets around the historic stadium.
Police said the shooting happened shortly after 7:50 p.m. local time on Saturday, 31 October, near the 400 block of Graymont Avenue West, close to the stadium. Officers and detectives responded to the scene, cordoned off the area and began an investigation, while rescue units transported victims for treatment. Birmingham Fire and Rescue reported four people injured, according to WVTM 13 reporting carried by HBCU Gameday, although police themselves had not confirmed a final victim count in their initial updates.
The shooting came minutes after the 85th edition of the Magic City Classic, the annual rivalry game between Alabama A&M University and Alabama State University. Alabama A&M won the game 31-28 at Legion Field, and large crowds had gathered in and around the stadium for the game and the tailgating celebrations that traditionally surround it.
In the immediate aftermath, the Birmingham Police Department announced that all Magic City Classic tailgating had been suspended. In a public message posted on Saturday evening, police told everyone to leave stadium property as soon as possible, urged the public not to travel to Legion Field, and said further information would be released as soon as it became available.
The sequence of events, as described in the early reporting, was fast-moving. The game had finished and crowds were still in the stadium area when shots were fired on Graymont Avenue. Emergency responders treated victims in the 300 and 400 blocks of the avenue, according to reporting from AL.com's Carol Robinson, and at least two rescue units had already left the scene while other victims were still being treated.
As of late Saturday night, the identities of the victims and the extent of their injuries had not been released, and police had not announced any arrest. Investigators also had not publicly identified a suspect or given a motive, and had not said whether the shooting was connected to an altercation linked to the game or to the surrounding festivities. Those gaps are normal in the first hours of such an investigation, but they mean the full picture is still to emerge.
What police have asked for is help from the public. The department is asking anyone who recorded footage that could assist investigators to submit it through its anonymous video submission portal, with contributors able to remain anonymous. In a city where many spectators film celebrations on their phones, detectives will hope that video helps establish how the shooting started, how many people were involved and in which direction people fled.
The Magic City Classic is one of the biggest annual events in Birmingham's calendar, drawing alumni, students and families from across Alabama and beyond for a weekend built around the football rivalry between two of the state's historically Black universities. Legion Field, which has hosted the game for decades, sits in a residential area of the city, and the crowds around it on game day extend well beyond the stadium gates into surrounding streets.
The shooting is the latest in a series of violent incidents to follow large public gatherings in the United States, and it will renew questions about security planning around major college football events, particularly where celebrations spill into surrounding neighbourhoods after the final whistle. Police have not yet said whether security arrangements for future games in Birmingham will change.
What happens next depends on the investigation now under way. Police could release a confirmed victim count and condition updates, name a suspect if one is identified, or appeal for further witnesses as video evidence is reviewed. Further statements are expected as detectives work through the scene and the footage, and this story will be updated as confirmed details become available.
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