A man who was shot during a “No Kings” protest in Salt Lake City, Utah, on Saturday, died in the hospital, police have announced.
“Our victim was not the intended target, but rather an innocent bystander participating in the demonstration,” Salt Lake City Police Chief Brian Redd said in a press conference on Sunday.
Police have identified the victim as Utah resident Arthur Folasa Ah Loo, 39. The Utah medical examiner’s officer will determine his official cause of death.
The Saturday night shooting began when Utah resident Arturo Gamboa, 24, allegedly raised a gun and ran towards a protest crowd around 8pm.
Two individuals in neon vests armed with handguns, thought to be serving on a “peacekeeping team” for the event, then moved to intervene, police said.
“During interviews, detectives learned the two peacekeepers saw Gamboa move away from the crowd and move into a secluded area behind a wall – behavior they found suspicious,” a police statement reads. “One of the peacekeepers told detectives he saw Gamboa pull out an AR-15-style rifle from a backpack and begin manipulating it. The peacekeepers drew their firearms and ordered Gamboa to drop the weapon.”
Witnesses said that Gamboa instead lifted his rifle and ran towards a crowd on State Street, holding the weapon in firing position.
“One of the individuals fired three rounds, striking Gamboa and tragically striking the man who later died,” Redd said at the press conference.
Neither police nor Gamboa fired any rounds.
Gamboa, who had a minor gunshot wound, was later found “hiding in a group of people,” Redd said, and officers recovered an AR-15 style assault rifle and a gas mask nearby.
Police “have developed probable cause that Gamboa acted under circumstances that showed a depraved indifference to human life, knowingly engaged in conduct that created a grave risk of death and ultimately caused the death of an innocent community member,” according to the department.
The 24-year-old had not been charged as of Sunday afternoon, and his only previous recorded interactions with law enforcement were two speeding tickets in 2023, The Salt Lake Tribune reports.
The actions of the apparent peacekeepers are also under investigation, and police have said the shooter is cooperating with officials. That individual is not currently in detention.
The Salt Lake City “No Kings” protest drew an estimated 10,000 people.
The event was part of a wave of “No Kings” protests across the country that drew an estimated 5 million attendees.
The protests occurred largely without incident, though there were sporadic arrests, and drivers struck demonstrators with their vehicles in Virginia and San Francisco, in the latter incident sending one person to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Police and protesters also clashed outside a federal building in Los Angeles.
