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| Shrine in Espanola during the prayerful rally on the day Jacob Johns was shot. |
Dear University of New Mexico and New Mexico community,
September 28, 2023, was a disheartening day for our New Mexico community. We learned that during a peaceful rally celebrating the delay of the re-installation of the Juan de Oñate statue outside a Rio Arriba County building in Española, an unprovoked gunman shot a peaceful protester.
This is the second time a shooting occurred at a peaceful rally against an Oñate statue. The first occurred two years ago in 2021 near Old Town in Albuquerque, when another unprovoked gunman shot and injured a peaceful protester. Here on the UNM main campus, we are pushing for the renaming of Oñate Hall. We should not honor the well-known legacy of violence and trauma.