MUNCIE, Ind. —  It made for what was almost certainly the most jarring local headline of 2023.

A spree of gunshots at a block party at Willard and Hackley streets on the early morning of July 30 left one man dead and 17 other people wounded.

It created a frightening, chaotic scene for the victims and the hundreds of others in attendance, along with the emergency responders who took the wounded to IU Health Ball Memorial Hospital and the police detectives who tried to sort out exactly what had unfolded.

A press conference held a day after the gunfire saw Muncie Mayor Dan Ridenour shed tears.

The fears created by the earliest headlines aside, it soon became apparent that this had almost certainly not been an effort by a gunman to shoot a large number of people.

Witnesses told police they saw Joseph Bonner — the 30-year-old Muncie man who suffered fatal gunshot wounds — and John L. Vance Jr., 36, of Yorktown, exchanging blows shortly before the gunfire was heard.

In a later interview with police, 29-year-old Justin Eliot Bonner IV — the brother of Joseph Bonner — said he was at the block party and saw Vance shoot his brother, who then fell to the ground.

The younger Bonner said he then pulled his own handgun from his waistband and shot “at and towards” Vance.

Vance is set to stand trial Jan. 29, in Delaware Circuit Court 2, on counts of aggravated battery, unlawful possession of a firearm by a serious violent felon and criminal recklessness.

The most serious count against him, aggravated battery, is a Level 3 felony carrying up to 16 years in prison.

Justin Bonner — charged with unlawful possession of a firearm by a serious violent felon, a Level 4 felony with a maximum 12-year sentence — is scheduled to stand trial on March 25 in Delaware Circuit Court 1.

Authorities appear to believe the vast majority of the shooting victims — part of a crowd estimated at up to 1,000 people — were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Deputy Police Chief Melissa Criswell said recently that with the results of forensic and ballistic tests still pending, she could not predict whether more arrests tied to the July 30 shootings might be made.

She also noted that the driver of a white vehicle that left the shooting scene at a high rate of speed — striking and seriously injuring a pedestrian — has yet to be identified.

Douglas Walker is a news reporter at The Star Press. Contact him at 765-213-5851 or at dwalker@muncie.gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Muncie Star Press: Police still investigating shooting spree that killed one, wounded 17