‘Checking for a pulse’: Attendees helped victims of Round Rock Juneteenth festival shooting

AUSTIN (KXAN) — A shooting at a Round Rock Juneteenth event left two people dead and as many as a dozen others injured, including children, according to local officials.

The Round Rock Police Department says a fight broke out between two groups, which led to the shooting. Police say all of the victims were innocent bystanders.

We’re now hearing from some of the people who stepped in to help those victims — including Amber Megens, a nurse for more than a decade. Megens told KXAN she showed up at Old Settlers Park a little after 10 p.m. to join hundreds of others in listening to the music planned for the night.

“Black events tend to get a bad rap at times, so we were just like, ‘Oh it’s nice out here,’” Megens said. “Everyone is just enjoying themselves and having a good time.”

Megens said one of the artists came out on stage and announced that his show had been canceled, but at that point, Megens didn’t know anything was wrong. That is until she started to head back to her car.

“Out of the corner of my eye I see a civilian giving CPR,” Megens described. She said police were trying to keep people away from the area but when Megens told officers she was CPR-certified, they waved her over.

Bystanders were working to help a woman who had been shot, Megens said.

“Just from my experience — I’ve worked in level one trauma — it did not look good,” she said. “From the beginning. I noticed that she had entry points on her abdomen. I had asked them, I was like checking for a pulse. There was a lady that was holding her head, and she was like, ‘I’ve been sitting here and I have not felt a pulse at all.’”

Police say two people died as a result of their injuries. Austin-Travis County EMS responded to the incident and said four adults and two kids had potentially serious injuries. Williamson County EMS took six people to local hospitals but could not share more about the patients’ injuries or conditions.