19-year-old killed at Ortega Farms house party

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A 19-year-old man was shot and killed at a house party in Ortega Farms early Saturday morning, according to the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office.

Police were called to the home on Liska Drive at 2:30 a.m. and when they arrived, they said 40 to 50 people were leaving the scene. They found the 19-year-old dead and an 18-year-old man who was grazed by a bullet.

Police are searching for a suspect and took several witnesses downtown for questioning.

Some of the partygoers started to argue and someone started shooting, police said.

One of the teens at the party, who did not want to be identified, said, “We were out here hanging with our friends and then there was a gunshot. Everybody started running, so when we saw everybody starting a running, we started running to because we got scared.”

"We have a lot of witnesses saying a lot of different things, so we are working through all of that now," said Sgt. Craig Waldrup.

That same female teenager said she she and her friends were there randomly.

She continues, “We saw all those people, so we figured we'd hang out with all of them. And that's when everything went down, so that's when we decided we were going to run and go. Because we didn't want anything to do with that.”

Police said multiple weapons were found at the scene.

Danita Upton lives in the area and said it's usually quiet, filled with families and kids.

Upton says, “It makes me upset that somebody else's mother has to find out that news about their child. The children play in the street all day. Everybody looks out for the kids. So for this to have happened is kind of alarming.”

Police are working on getting video of the incident to help them in their investigation.

"I think the size of this party and the amount of people that were on the street, the people were from all over, based on what we're getting," said Waldrup.

Anyone with information is urged to call JSO at 904-630-0500 or Crime Stoppers at 866-845-TIPS.