ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Since Nov. 14, there have been five different shootings in the same area of St. Petersburg, south of downtown. All five involved violence between people who knew one another.
Wednesday afternoon made six and this time, the violence left a man dead and a police officer in the hospital.
The community has held events calling for an end to the violence and a plan to address the systemic root causes of some of these altercations such as poverty and inadequate schools.
RELATED: New 'Enough is Enough' campaign to address gun violence, community issues in St. Petersburg
On Thursday morning at the city council meeting held just sixteen hours after the shooting, members of the community lined up to voice their concerns with city council.
Community activist Ashley Green choked back tears as she said, "While I wait to judge, I certainly have questions that deserved to be answered. How did yesterday make our community safer? Who made our community safer? Where was the body camera footage?"
Green committed much of her three-minute speaking allotment to addressing the income and learning gaps for children that create insurmountable inequities that last a lifetime.
"We must stand up and fight like hell or we’ll be here next year with another slogan, with another excuse, with another justification for why someone has to bury their child," said Green.
A few hours later, St. Petersburg Police Chief Anthony Holloway held a news conference asking the public to be patient, allow the facts of the case to come out, and not rush to judgement.
Holloway could not answer questions about the facts of the shooting because the Pinellas County Sheriff's office is leading the criminal investigation, a change prompted by the community this past summer.
In July, law enforcement agencies in Pinellas County teamed up to announce that investigations into an officer’s use of deadly force will be carried out by an independent task force made up of homicide detectives from other agencies across Pinellas County.
RELATED: Pinellas law enforcement will no longer investigate their own officers' use of deadly force
On Thursday, Holloway said he had spoken with many community leaders after the shooting and reiterated that the new investigation protocol gives outside eyes a chance to comb through the details adding, "This is what the community asked for."
St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman was also at the news conference hours after being criticized by members of the public who spoke at the city council meeting.
He addressed the shooting on his Facebook page Thursday afternoon.
A spokesperson with the police department told 10 Tampa Bay that body cameras are coming soon. In fact, the first squads will get their equipment and start training next week.
It will take until at least January to have the entire force equipped with the body cameras and properly trained.