Troopers respond to reported fight, gun at annual youth football jamboree
The fight included at one person brandishing a weapon near the football field as children played.
What you need to know:
- Alaska State Troopers responded to a Pop Warner youth football jamboree at Colony High School on Saturday after witnesses reported a brief fight between two men, during which at least one man displayed a large gun. The men left before troopers arrived. No shots were fired, and no injuries or arrests were reported.
- About 1,500 people, including hundreds of youth football players and cheerleaders, attended the daylong jamboree, which featured teams from across Southcentral.
- Event organizers said they responded after learning of the fight, but the men had already left. They said they did not activate emergency procedures because they were not aware a gun had been involved until they spoke with troopers afterward.
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PALMER — State troopers responded to an annual Pop Warner football jamboree at Colony High School on Saturday after spectators reported a brief fistfight between two men during which witnesses said at least one of the men brandished a large gun.
At least 1,500 people, including hundreds of young football players and cheerleaders, attended the daylong event, which included games between eight teams from across Southcentral, organizers said.
Troopers were notified of the fight at about 11:30 a.m. Saturday, Alaska Department of Public Safety spokesperson Austin McDaniel said in a statement Monday. The individuals were gone before troopers arrived, witnesses declined to identify them, and no arrests were made, he said.
No injuries were reported. An investigation is ongoing, he said.
The two men were fighting in a small accessible parking area between a practice field and the Colony High School football field, said Kalley Harmon, whose 12-year-old son was participating in the event. It was not clear what the fight was about, she said.
"They were fighting and screaming at each other, and the next thing I know, one of them pulled out a gun," she said.
Harmon and another witness described the gun as "enormous" and "much bigger than a handgun."
The men separated and left the area. No shots were fired, witnesses said.
No announcements were made during the event about the fight or the presence of a weapon, Harmon said.
Pop Warner is not affiliated with the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District. The field was rented from the district for the event.
Officials with the Mat-Su Seahawks football and cheer team searched the area as soon as they learned there was a fight, but the men had already left, said Nigel Brown, the Seahawks commissioner.
They did not make an announcement about the incident or activate their emergency response plan because they did not learn a gun was involved until they spoke with troopers, he said. If they had known, their response would have been very different, he said.
"If we were actually dealing with someone who is possessing a firearm, first thing we are going to do is get on the radios, get the kids to a safe place — a place behind the fence area, by the baseball field, away from the event," he said.
Brown said his team worked with law enforcement to try to identify the men and then walked the grounds to conduct a safety check.
While arguments sometimes break out between parents and referees, fights such as the one Saturday are very uncommon, he said.
"The situation was handled as quickly and as safely as possible with the information we had," he said.
-- Contact Amy Bushatz at contact@matsusentinel.com