‘Chaos’: Hundreds show up to a pool party that turned into a deadly shooting that was booked through a peer-to-peer rental app

What began as a rented pool party in north Charlotte ended in gunfire, panic, and a scene that neighbors say looked more like a mass escape than a private event in a residential neighborhood.

In a report for WSOC-TV, crime reporter Hunter Sáenz said the gathering on Hucks Road near Old Statesville Road started as a party booked through Swimply, a peer-to-peer rental app often described as something like Airbnb for pools. By the time the night unraveled, though, the party had swelled far beyond what anyone seems to have expected, and police say five people were shot. One of them, 20-year-old Richard Thomas, died.

That alone would make this a serious local tragedy.

But Sáenz’s reporting also points to something broader and more troubling: how easily a private residential property can turn into a large, loosely controlled event space once an app, a crowd, and weak limits collide. The details from neighbors and residents make the whole thing sound less like a party that got interrupted and more like a setup that was already too big to hold safely before a single shot was fired.

A Rental App Party That Grew Far Beyond the Limit

Hunter Sáenz reported that the woman connected to the home said the pool had been rented out through Swimply, an app that allows homeowners or renters to lease access to private pools and other backyard amenities.

That concept may sound simple enough on paper. A family pool becomes a side income stream, guests pay for time, and everyone leaves. But in this case, Sáenz said the event quickly ballooned far past anything that looks manageable in an ordinary neighborhood setting.

The woman told WSOC-TV that she had counted about 200 people and told the organizer not to let anyone else in after that point.

Still, she later estimated that around 500 teens and young adults were there by the time she left. That is the kind of number that changes the meaning of the event entirely. A couple hundred people at a private home is already a lot. Five hundred is not really a backyard gathering anymore. It is a crowd event, just one without the infrastructure, security standards, or emergency planning that usually comes with a crowd event.

Sáenz said the front lawn was packed with cars, and people were parking not only at the house but also in nearby developments and neighborhoods, then walking in.

That image says a lot by itself. Once cars are overflowing across yards and surrounding streets, the event has clearly outgrown the property. At that point, the house is no longer hosting the party. It is losing control of it.

Security Was There, But It Was Not Enough

One of the most striking parts of Hunter Sáenz’s report is that this was not a totally unmonitored free-for-all from the beginning.

The woman tied to the house said people under 21 were marked with wristbands, and attendees were patted down before being allowed into the backyard. That detail suggests there was at least some awareness that the crowd needed rules and some effort at control.

But just as clearly, it was not enough.

Sáenz said the woman herself admitted that “something was missed,” and that feels like an understatement after what happened. If five people were shot and one person died, then whatever security was in place either broke down, was too light for the size of the crowd, or was never capable of handling a gathering that large in the first place.

That is part of what makes the story so unsettling.

The event does not sound like a spontaneous block party that simply spiraled. It sounds like an attempt to organize a large private gathering using partial screening measures in a setting that was never built to carry that kind of risk. A pat-down and wristbands may sound responsible at first, but when the crowd swells into the hundreds, those measures can start to look more cosmetic than effective.

And once panic starts, none of it matters anyway.

“People Was Flying Everywhere”

The strongest moments in Sáenz’s report came from the people who actually saw the aftermath with their own eyes.

Inside the taped-off backyard, he described the remains of the party still sitting where the chaos left them: plastic bottles and trash floating in the water, shoes and sandals scattered around the yard after people ran out of them trying to escape. A nearby Ring camera captured the sound of the gunfire, freezing the moment in a way that turns a neighborhood party into a permanent record of violence.

That kind of visual aftermath is hard to shake.

Neighbor Colby Granger told Sáenz he was home with his newborn when the shooting erupted. He said he felt helpless, fearing that a bullet might come through his own home. When he looked outside, what he saw sounded like total disorder.

As Granger put it to WSOC-TV, there were “people sprinting,” with what he estimated looked like 150 in the backyard and another 50 in the front, with people hiding in bushes, running across the street, jumping into cars, and drivers pulling through the yard to pick them up.

Then he gave the word that now hangs over the whole story: “chaos.”

That is not dramatic language added after the fact. It is probably the most accurate single-word description possible. When a party collapses so fast that people leave behind shoes in the grass and cars start cutting through a yard to collect fleeing guests, the event has crossed over into something far more dangerous than a local noise complaint or a rowdy gathering.

The People Inside the House Saw It Too

Sáenz also spoke to people who were inside the property when the gunfire broke out, which adds another layer to the story.

Serge Arnaud, who lives in the house where the party was held, told WSOC-TV that his room faces the yard and that when the shooting started, he saw “them kids flying” and “people was flying everywhere.” It is rough phrasing, but that rawness actually makes it more believable. It sounds like someone replaying panic in real time, not giving a polished statement.

Arnaud was in the house around 7 p.m. when, according to police, the shots rang out.

That time matters because it undercuts the usual assumption that this kind of violence only breaks loose deep into the night after hours of escalation. This happened early enough that families were still home next door with newborns, neighbors were still nearby, and the evening had not even fully shifted into the late-night phase most people associate with a party turning bad.

That makes the situation feel even more reckless.

A gathering that large in a residential area already carries risk. Once violence enters it before night has even settled in, it suggests the problem was not just alcohol, darkness, or time. It suggests the event itself was unstable from the start because it had grown too big, too fast, and too far beyond any realistic control.

A Neighborhood Problem, Not Just a One-Night Tragedy

One of the most important details in Hunter Sáenz’s report is that neighbors say this was not some one-off use of the property.

Multiple neighbors told WSOC-TV that there had been dozens of pool parties at the house going back to last summer, with some even featuring DJs. That turns the story from a single awful night into something more systemic. If residential pools are being repeatedly turned into large event venues, then this was not just about one organizer making one terrible judgment call.

It points to a bigger gap in oversight.

Peer-to-peer rental apps can make almost anything look like a business opportunity, but neighborhoods are not built to absorb every kind of business equally. Renting out a spare room for quiet visitors is one thing. Turning a house with a pool into an on-demand event site for hundreds of people is something else entirely.

That is why the neighbors’ reaction matters.

According to Sáenz, people living nearby now want more regulation around renting residential pools. And honestly, that does not sound unreasonable after a night like this. When an app-based rental can lead to a gathering so large that cars spill across lawns, hundreds pack into a private property, and a mass shooting follows, the question is no longer whether neighbors are overreacting.

The question is why tighter rules were not already in place.

The Party Ended, But the Questions Are Just Starting

Hunter Sáenz’s report gives the outline of what happened on Hucks Road, but it also leaves behind a larger set of questions that local leaders are now going to have to answer.

How does a pool rental in a neighborhood become a gathering of roughly 500 people? What standards, if any, should apply when private homes are effectively used as commercial party venues? And how much responsibility sits with the organizer, the people tied to the property, the platform that enabled the rental, or the lack of local rules strong enough to stop it before it got this far?

Those are not small questions, and they matter because this is the kind of story that can repeat.

One person is dead. Four others were wounded. Neighbors with children were left listening to gunfire and watching crowds scatter through yards and bushes. A backyard pool party ended as a homicide scene, with trash in the water and abandoned shoes in the grass.

That is more than a tragedy. It is a warning.

Because once a residential property becomes large enough to host hundreds, it is no longer just someone’s backyard. And if communities do not decide where that line is, nights like this can draw it for them in the worst possible way.