A party in an illegal after-hours basement club in Bridgeport turned deadly in the early morning of May 16, 2021. Responding to reports of gunfire around 1:56 a.m., officers found two men with gunshot wounds at 1023 Main Street. Charles Dimples Barnes, 38, was pronounced dead at the scene from a gunshot wound to the head. Norman Charles Peter, 40, from Stamford, had multiple gunshot wounds to his arm, abdomen, and thigh and was taken to St. Vincent’s Medical Center, where he later died.

The makeshift venue lacked basic safety features such as sprinklers, multiple exits, and functioning smoke detectors. Panic followed the shooting as patrons rushed for the single exit. No arrests have been made for the murders; investigators did charge several people connected to the illegal operation. Josiah Israel, 35, and Christopher Mojica, 37, face charges related to illegal sale of alcohol, conspiracy, and second-degree reckless endangerment, and organizer Mitchel Noel, 37, was charged with second-degree reckless endangerment for renting the unsafe space. A probationary police officer who had been at the event lost her badge after it was found at the scene and was terminated.

Who in the Bridgeport area might have seen or heard anything that night and can help investigators piece together what happened?