What could have been done to prevent Chiefs rally tragedy? Kansas City police won’t say

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Around lunchtime on the day after the Chiefs were crowned Super Bowl champs, Kansas City Police Chief Stacey Graves gave brief remarks at a pre-victory-parade news conference under the clock at Union Station.

“No one is more prepared than us,” Graves said in summarizing the security precautions. “We are going to make sure Kansas City has a safe, fun day.”

Wednesday was a fun day until the pop-pop-pop of gunfire brought chaos and death outside that same historic building where for the fourth time in a decade Kansas City has celebrated a world championship.

To the west on the lower side of Union Station, one person was killed by gunfire. Twenty-two others were shot and wounded, some critically. They ranged between 8 and 47 years old. Half or more were under 16.

How could that happen when more than 850 law enforcement officers were along Wednesday’s parade route and at the Super Bowl rally for the victorious Kansas City Chiefs?

Graves and her department have no answers yet. Two juveniles are in custody. Investigators are trying to piece together what happened near where only moments earlier coach Andy Reid’s talented squad sang and danced and bellowed.

What could have been done differently from a security standpoint?

Could all those cops, sheriff’s deputies, highway patrol officers, FBI agents, etc., have been deployed differently? Should there have been more? Were there gaps in the security?

Parking garages, like the one in or around where the shooting occurred, for instance, are sometimes soft targets at big events because that’s not where people are gathering.

How many law enforcement officers were on the ground there?

So far, the KCPD has been unable to answer some of those questions and unwilling to entertain others that they consider “hypothetical” while focusing on the immediate crime and bringing the perpetrators to justice.

At a post-shooting news conference Thursday morning, Mayor Quinton Lucas offered his support as reporters pressed for answers.

“I think our police officers did an outstanding job yesterday,” he said. “I’m not here to second-guess any part of that work. I know that we will review this situation like we do any other incident to make sure that we can keep the people of Kansas City safe in future times.”

KCPD won’t discuss what went wrong

Kansas City police declined to discuss their security plans for this week’s event.

As with the victory celebrations that came before, dating to the Royals World Series win in 2015 and three Chiefs championships since 2020, plans for this parade and rally were developed by police in conjunction with the Kansas City Sports Commission.

“They are updated annually as needed based on experiences of previous large events,” said Officer Alayna Gonzalez, a police spokeswoman.

Or as Graves said at Monday’s news conference: “Every year we get better and better.”

Planning for an event that may never happen, like this week’s victory parade and rally, can take weeks and months. Sports Commission CEO Kathy Nelson said this year’s planning began in the fall.

But unlike the kind of events that occur on a regular schedule and can be planned for months and years in advance, planning for sudden victory parades is by its very nature less thorough.

The Super Bowl is in the same league as presidential inaugurations, when it comes to the amount of security precautions that go into public events.

Since the attacks of 9/11, they have been classified as National Special Security Events, in which the U.S. Secret Service, FBI and Federal Emergency Management Agency have lead roles.

The 2012 Major League Baseball All-Star Game in Kansas City was in that special security category. Kansas City police were instrumental, but federal law-enforcement agencies were in charge and set the rules.

Victory parades are local events, on the other hand, with federal agencies playing supporting roles.

On Thursday, Graves thanked the department’s “federal partners” with helping investigate the rally shooting.

Security tighter at NFL Draft

While not as powerful as the federal government, the NFL has sway when it hosts a major event in your city. The league mandated security precautions for last year’s NFL Draft in Kansas City that were far stricter than what was employed at this week’s parade and rally.

And there was no gun violence.

About 300,000 people attended the free, three-day event last April. But access to the grounds was controlled, whereas anyone could enter Wednesday’s rally and find a spot on the grass, pavement, or in a tree.

Billed as the largest space devoted to the draft in its 88-year history, the 3.1 million-square-foot event space in Kansas City stretched all the way from the historic train station to the south entrance road to Liberty Memorial. Everything within that oval, including the National WWI Museum and Memorial, was surrounded by 7.5 miles of temporary fence.

There were three entrances — two near Union Station were for VIPs and staff — but nearly all fans entered through a single gate where Wyandotte Street intersects with Memorial Drive at the southern end of the perimeter.

Everyone went through a security checkpoint just like at a Chiefs game. They were not allowed to bring in chairs, cans, bottles, coolers or cups, and especially not backpacks that might contain weapons.

But even the smaller bags that were allowed went through a metal detector.

Those attending also had to first download an app on their phones before entering and let security scan a code. No loitering was allowed around the perimeter of the event.

It’s not clear how long it took to install the fence as well as what Forbes magazine reported was 1.5 miles of concrete barriers.

According to the parks permit that was issued for the event and obtained by The Star through an open records request, the NFL had from April 3 to the start of the draft on April 27 to set up the perimeter and the temporary structures within it.

Did it take a few days to put up the fence or far longer? Neither the producer of the event nor the Kansas City Sports Commission, which organized both events, responded Thursday to The Star’s request asking for that information.

A spokeswoman for the museum and memorial said she did not know.

Parades are different, police say

“A parade is a wholly different event than the NFL draft,” police public information officer Gonzalez said in response to The Star’s questions about security precautions after Thursday’s news conference.

“The NFL draft was held solely at Union Station and did not include a parade route covering a significant portion of the downtown area.”

She declined to respond to a question asking whether it might have been possible to have had tighter security at the rally alone, where people were packed in tighter than along the 1.8-mile parade route.

“Hypothetical questions could be asked all day long,” she said. “We are focused on the details that we know at this time.”

But a top local law enforcement official with experience in providing security at all three past victory parades in Kansas City told The Star that police and parade planners might have to consider such a hybrid security arrangement in the future.

“Although it’s gonna create bottlenecks and headaches, but they’re probably going to have to have more gates that you come in and come out of,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the individual works for a different agency than KCPD and isn’t involved in the investigation. “Right now the only place that you usually have (limited access) is around the stage. … But the rest of it is come in as wish.”

At Thursday’s news conference, Lucas said city and local law enforcement will be working with others to see how similar tragedies can be avoided at large, outside, public events in the future.

Such as the big one that occurs nearly every year on March 17 through Westport.

“We have a plan for (a) St. Patrick’s Day parade in Kansas City, we have parades all the time, I don’t think they’ll end. Certainly we recognize the public safety challenges at issue …

“And we’ll do everything that we can both as a city and working with our state and federal partners to see that we can help avoid these types of situations.”

He noted that gun violence has marred celebrations in other cities in recent years, but said Wednesday’s shooting won’t stop Kansas City from having a Super Bowl parade next year should the Chiefs do the unprecedented and win three in a row.

“I do think that there’s a gun violence challenge in this community and many others, and there certainly is a gun violence challenge as it relates to major events,” Lucas said.

“That, however, does not mean that Kansas City will stop having major events.”