Neighbors Called 911 Warning of a ‘Full-Out War.’
Then a Mob at a July 4 Block Party Attacked the Officers Sent to Stop It.
“Everybody got guns. We need the police out here bad.” That was one of thirteen separate 911 calls Charleston County Dispatch fielded on the night of July 4, 2026, as a city-permitted block party in North Charleston’s Chicora-Cherokee neighborhood spiraled into gunfire in the street. Fox News Digital and Live 5 News obtained the recordings through a public-records request and published them on July 8 — four days after the chaos, and two days after cellphone video of officers being swarmed and beaten went viral.
The gathering had run for roughly a decade without major incident. This year, an estimated 400 to 500 people showed up. By 8:30 p.m., fireworks were being fired at passing cars, guns were out, and residents were calling 911 to say they were afraid to stand near their own front doors. When North Charleston police tried to shut it down, a crowd fought back — dragging one female officer to the ground and beating her on camera before a second officer intervened with a stun gun.
Seven people, four of them juveniles, are now charged — presumed innocent unless and until a court says otherwise. This page walks through the 911 audio, the timeline NCPD has laid out publicly, the charges as filed, and the reactions from Mayor Reggie Burgess, Police Chief Ron Camacho, and U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC-1), sourced to the primary recordings and the outlets that obtained and verified them.
- 13 calls — separate 911 calls placed to Charleston County Dispatch during the night's chaos · Source: Fox News Digital; Live 5 News
- 400–500+ — estimated attendees at the city-permitted Chicora-Cherokee block party, in its roughly tenth year without a major incident before this one · Source: Live 5 News; Post and Courier
- 20–30 shots — gunshots one caller told dispatchers she heard fired outside her home · Source: Fox News Digital 911 audio
- 7 charged — people charged so far, four of them juveniles, in an investigation NCPD says remains active · Source: Live 5 News; Post and Courier
- 2 officers — injured trying to break up the fighting — both back on duty within days · Source: NCPD; ABC News 4
The Chicora-Cherokee block party has run every Fourth of July for roughly a decade, and until this year it had gone off without major incident — a city-permitted neighborhood gathering, not an unsanctioned street takeover. North Charleston police leadership met with organizers earlier on July 4 to walk through traffic control, parking, and emergency-vehicle access, the routine coordination the event has required for years. None of that prevented what happened after dark.
Around 8:30 p.m., officers responding to reports of fireworks being fired at passing vehicles found something worse: people in the crowd were carrying and firing guns. Over the next stretch of the night, Charleston County Dispatch logged thirteen separate 911 calls from residents on or near the street. Fox News Digital and Live 5 News, which obtained the recordings through a public-records request filed with the county, published transcript excerpts and audio clips on July 8. The callers describe a night that moved, in the words of more than one of them, like a war zone in their own neighborhood.
“Everybody got guns. We need the police out here bad.”
North Charleston resident, 911 call, July 4, 2026 — via Charleston County Dispatch, obtained by Fox News Digital and Live 5 News
One caller told dispatchers she had already phoned in once and was still waiting: “I called 45 minutes ago and asked to have officers come out here to break up a group of kids with firearms. Now there’s like a full-out war going on outside my front door.” Another resident, describing a scene that had moved from her street to a nearby yard, said she had her own firearm in hand: “I have my gun in my hand. If they come on my property, I will kill somebody.” That same caller told dispatchers she believed she had heard 20 to 30 shots fired.
A third caller described watching the moment gunfire actually started: “One of them ran to the trunk, said ‘get the strap, get the strap.’ I came inside and about ten seconds later I heard three gunshots.” Others focused on the randomness of the danger rather than any single triggering moment. “They’re shooting randomly. A bullet can come through at any second,” one caller said, before confirming to the dispatcher, “Yeah, I’m in danger.” Another put it more plainly: “I am feeling unsafe. There is a lot of drinking, and they are shooting. It’s just chaos on our street.”
Perhaps the most striking line in the 911 audio isn’t about the gunfire at all — it’s a resident’s resignation. “This happens every year, and every year I call the police,” one caller told the dispatcher, a comment that reframes the night less as a single catastrophic breakdown and more as an escalation of a pattern neighbors say they’d already been living with. The block party itself wasn’t new and wasn’t unpermitted; what was new, according to residents and the volume of calls that night, was the scale of the weapons and the willingness of a crowd to keep fighting after police told them the party was over.
NBC Nightly News later folded the North Charleston attack into a national segment on what it called a “teen takeover” trend — large, loosely organized youth gatherings, often coordinated on social media, that overwhelm the police presence originally planned for a smaller or better-controlled event. North Charleston Police Department Crime Prevention Officer Pfc. Joshua Silva spoke publicly about roughly a decade of community-trust work the department has invested in Chicora-Cherokee specifically — work he said made the scale of this year’s violence especially hard to absorb, since the block party had been treated as a model of that trust rather than a flashpoint for it.
Once officers on scene confirmed people in the crowd were armed, NCPD made the call to end the gathering outright — announcing over loudspeaker that the event was over and ordering the crowd to disperse, a standard de-escalation step meant to clear the street before anyone got hurt. It didn’t work. Fights broke out as the crowd was pushed to leave, and more gunfire followed the dispersal order rather than stopping because of it.
Officers got out of their patrol cars to physically separate combatants in the crowd. Cellphone video that went viral in the days afterward shows a female officer pulled to the ground while trying to detain a woman; she was punched repeatedly and struck with an object bystanders and reporting described as possibly a Roman candle or a stick pulled from the fighting around her. A second officer moved in and deployed a stun gun to break up the assault. Two female NCPD officers were injured in the melee — both were treated for what the department described as minor injuries and were back on duty within days.
Viral cellphone footage captured a female North Charleston officer being pulled to the ground while attempting to detain a woman in the crowd, then punched repeatedly and struck with an object reported as possibly a Roman candle or stick. A second officer intervened and deployed a stun gun to end the assault.
Separately, a 21-year-old man is accused of taking a Taser and loaded magazines from an officer who had just been assaulted — a distinct incident from the video, charged as unlawful taking of a weapon from law enforcement.
Both injured officers were treated for minor injuries and returned to duty within days. NCPD has not publicly released either officer’s name.
Video: A North Charleston police officer was dragged to the ground and beaten by a crowd while trying to break up a July 4 block party in the Chicora-Cherokee neighborhood. A second officer used a stun gun to end the assault. Both officers are expected to recover.
North Charleston Police Chief Ron Camacho— the department’s first Hispanic police chief — held a press conference on July 6 and again on July 7-8 to walk through what officers recovered and who had been arrested. Investigators recovered four firearms from the scene, along with a makeshift spear: a blade affixed to a pole. By July 8, the total number of people charged stood at seven, four of them juveniles whose identities have not been publicly released, consistent with standard practice for minors.
Among the adults charged, Giovanni Mekhi Sincere Campbell, 19, of North Charleston, faces a charge of possession of a machine gun — the statutory term used in the charging document, which under state and federal firearms law typically describes a weapon modified to fire automatically, such as with an auto-sear or similar conversion device, rather than a literal belt-fed weapon. Investigators have not detailed the specific mechanism publicly. Sa’Mya Adriana Collette Weaver, 18, is charged with breach of peace and assault on a police officer while resisting arrest.
A third adult, Dejuan Ravenel, 21, of Charleston, was charged separately with unlawful taking of a weapon from law enforcement, accused of taking a Taser and loaded magazines from an officer who had just been assaulted in the melee. The four charged juveniles face third-degree assault by mob, assault on a police officer while resisting arrest, resisting arrest, possession of a machine gun, and breach of peace. All seven defendants are presumed innocent; Camacho and NCPD have said the investigation remains active and additional arrests are possible.
Giovanni Mekhi Sincere Campbell, 19 (North Charleston): possession of a machine gun.
Sa’Mya Adriana Collette Weaver, 18: breach of peace; assault on a police officer while resisting arrest.
Dejuan Ravenel, 21 (Charleston): unlawful taking of a weapon from law enforcement.
Four juveniles (names not released): third-degree assault by mob; assault on a police officer while resisting arrest; resisting arrest; possession of a machine gun; breach of peace.
All seven are presumed innocent. NCPD says the investigation is active and more arrests are possible.
Mayor Reggie Burgess, North Charleston’s first Black mayor and a former NCPD police chief himself, addressed the attack directly in the days after the video went viral. “We’re not going to let this incident define the city of North Charleston,” Burgess said. “We’re not going to let a few define this community.” North Charleston’s mayoral elections are officially nonpartisan — no party appears on the ballot — and South Carolina does not register voters by party at all, so no confirmed party affiliation exists for Burgess in the public record; none is asserted here.
Chief Camacho, an appointed and non-elected official, struck a more troubled tone about what the department is up against going forward. “We need some help from the community because stuff like this is getting dangerous,” he said, adding: “I am looking for any way possible to solve this issue of unruly juveniles. It’s very complex.” Both statements point at the same underlying problem NCPD has described publicly — a permitted, decade-old community event that outgrew the police planning built around it, with juveniles making up more than half of those now charged.
Our officers went to a permitted community event to keep the peace and were attacked by a mob for doing their jobs. We're grateful both officers are recovering and back on duty, and we support the charges filed against those responsible.
U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC-1), whose district includes North Charleston, released a statement condemning the attack and calling for the strongest available prosecution. “What was supposed to be a day of celebration for 250 years of American freedom turned into a horrifying sight in North Charleston,” Mace said. “We stand with the North Charleston Police Department and are relieved both officers are back on duty.” Mace urged that those responsible be prosecuted “to the fullest extent of the law.”
Mace is identified here with her party affiliation because she holds a partisan federal office; Burgess and Camacho are not, because neither holds a partisan office under South Carolina law and neither has a confirmed party affiliation in the public record. The distinction matters for accuracy, not for softening: this page names every official by title and describes their public statements in full regardless of whether a party label applies.
North Charleston police say they're still investigating the block party attack, with more arrests possible. Chief Ron Camacho tells me the department is leaning on years of community-trust work in Chicora-Cherokee to try to keep this from happening again.
Two North Charleston officers were assaulted trying to break up a block party that spiraled into gunfire — one dragged to the ground and beaten on camera. Both are back on duty. Seven people, four of them juveniles, now face charges.
No trial dates have been set for any of the seven people charged, and Chief Camacho has been direct that the case is not closed: investigators are continuing to review evidence, and NCPD has said more arrests remain possible as the review continues. Because four of the seven charged are juveniles, their cases will move through South Carolina’s family court system rather than the adult docket that will handle Campbell, Weaver, and Ravenel — a distinction that will likely mean different timelines and different public visibility for each track of the case going forward.
It is not yet clear whether North Charleston will change how it permits or staffs the Chicora-Cherokee block party going forward; the city has not announced a policy response beyond the enforcement already underway, and neither Burgess nor Camacho has said publicly whether the roughly decade-old gathering will return next July 4. What is documented is the record itself: thirteen 911 calls, a decade of an event that had not previously required this kind of response, and video of officers being attacked while trying to end it — all now part of the public file because a records request, not a leak, put the audio in the open.
A block party that had run peacefully for roughly a decade turned into gunfire, thirteen frantic 911 calls, and a mob attack on the officers sent to end it. Two female officers were injured — one dragged to the ground and beaten on camera — before both returned to duty within days. Seven people, four of them minors, are now charged and presumed innocent while NCPD says the investigation is still open. Mayor Reggie Burgess and Chief Ron Camacho, neither of whom holds a partisan office, have called for community help rather than pointing to political blame; Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC-1) has called for the fullest prosecution the law allows. The 911 audio, obtained through a public-records request rather than leaked or dramatized, is the clearest record of what actually happened on that street on July 4 — residents who called for help and got a “full-out war” instead.
