Two New York University business students were killed while vacationing in Puerto Rico over the weekend, school officials said.
The victims were identified as Franco Medina Angulo and Sergio Palomino Ruiz, international students from Peru who were enrolled at the Stern School of Business, a New York University spokesman said.
The two students were on vacation in Puerto Rico with a group to celebrate a birthday before finals when things went wrong, a school spokesman said.
They were bystanders «caught in an altercation between two unrelated groups» when they were killed early Saturday morning, New York University spokesman John Beckman said in a statement.
He described them as «victims of tragic and senseless shooting.»
Puerto Rico police said the shooting occurred in front of a business on Loiza Street in San Juan.
Police from the Puerto Rico Criminal Investigation Corps are investigating the incident and shared video showing a woman firing from the sidewalk and asked for help identifying her in connection with the deaths of the students.
“The University has contacted the other members of the group to offer them support and help; none of the others were injured,» Beckman said in a statement. “NYU has also reached out to the families of the students killed to provide any help we can and to express the condolences of the university community.”
Counseling services will be available to students in the program and close friends of the murdered students.
«NYU mourns today with the family, loved ones and friends of these students, whose lives ended tragically, suddenly and too soon.»
A dean of the Stern School of Business said a scholarship will be established in each of Angulo’s and Ruiz’s names, NBC New York informed.
A fundraiser to collect donations to support their families has raised more than $44,000 as of Tuesday.