Seton Hall Shooting: Campus Mourns Victim Jessica Moore
EAST ORANGE, N.J. (CBS/WCBS/AP) Friends, teachers and fellow students remembered Seton Hall University student Jessica Moore as strong and selfless, just hours after she was fatally shot at an off-campus frat party by a gunman who also wounded four others.
The gunman remained at large early Sunday, police said.
Some 500 students, faculty and staff attended a Saturday evening prayer service at the school for Jessica Moore, 19. Moore's parents, grandparents and uncle were also on campus, mourning her death and praying for her.
Moore had been at the party early Saturday when a fight started after a man was kicked out because he didn't want to pay the cover charge, said a student who said she attended the party and had classes with Moore. The woman did not give her name, citing fears for her safety because the shooter was not in custody.
She said the man came back and began firing, sending screaming partygoers rushing out the door and climbing out windows.
The other four victims were hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries, and one has been released, said East Orange Police Sgt. Andrew Di Elmo.
The victims did not know the shooter, who fled from the apartment on foot, Di Elmo said. Police offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to the suspect's capture.
Police said that two of the wounded are both 19-year-old women who go to Seton Hall, and one is a 25-year-old man who attends the New Jersey Institute of Technology. The fifth victim is a 20-year-old man from New York City who is not a student.
Seton Hall, a private Catholic university in nearby South Orange, about 15 miles west of New York City, enrolls about 10,000 students.
Moore was a sophomore honors student from Disputanta, Va., majoring in psychology, said the university's interim president, Gabriel Esteban, who appeared to be on the verge of tears during a news conference on campus.
Police were not releasing the other victims' names because the shooter wasn't in custody, Di Elmo said.
The school's Department of Public Safety urged students to "travel in groups when walking off campus."
Anyone with information on this case is urged to call the East Orange Police Department's violent crime task force at 973-266-5060 or the anonymous tip-line at 973-266-5041.
Reporting Contributed by CBS Affiliate WCBS
