JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Police were kept busy last night with five separate shootings in Jacksonville.
The first shooting happened just after 8:30 Saturday night on the Westside.
By 6 Sunday morning there had been four more shootings across the city. One involved an apartment security guard and one left a victim in critical condition.
Paulina Mendenhall says "I was very scared last night."
Mendenhall lives at the Summer Oaks Apartments where one of the shootings happened. She is just happy her son is safe after her family spent the night huddled on the floor their apartment.
Paulina Mendenhall says “I woke up and heard pa pa pa pa.”
Police say it was around 3:30 Sunday morning when a security guard saw a man firing shots into the air at the Summer Oaks Apartments off of the Arlington Expressway. The suspect pointed his gun at the guard who then fired his gun.
The suspect ran away but was eventually taken into custody.
Neighbor Otha Harris says “it's alarming but it helps us to know that we have to be alert in our communities.”
The Summer Oaks shooting was just one of five that happened in a ten-hour span. The first happened around 8:30 Saturday night on the Westside. Police say they found a man shot in the lower stomach at a home on Canaveral Road.
He was taken to UF Health and is expected to be ok. Police say another man and woman were at the scene but would not say if or how they were involved.
Just one hour later a man was shot multiple times at the Mission Pointe Apartments on Biscayne Boulevard on the Northside. The man was taken to the hospital in critical condition as police tried to find the shooter. Police interviewed several witnesses to the shooting that happened inside the gated community.
Neighbor Amber Cruse says “there was like all these police cars.”
Across town around 4 Sunday morning one person was found shot at a home on Grant Street in Downtown Jacksonville. The person was transported to UF Health and is expected to be OK. Police say a witness was detained and questioned.
And just before 6 a.m., police found a man shot in the back outside the America's Best Inn on Dix Ellis Trail. It was a night of violence that neighbors just want to forget.
Paulina Mendenhall says “right now I'm talking to you in still very, very scared, it was very terrible.”
We've also posted a link to JSO’s crime mapping page - where you can get information about crimes in your neighborhood.
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