'Pray For My Son:' Middletown Teen Shot In Jacksonville

MIDDLETOWN, NJ — "Pray for my son."

That's what the mother of George Amadeo, a teenager from Middletown, wants everybody to do, since he was one of the 11 people injured in the mass shooting that occurred Sunday night at a video game tournament in Jacksonville, Florida. Three people total — the shooter, and two innocent young men competing in a Madden tournament — were killed in the shooting.

George — the young man who once ran cross country for Middletown High School North, and loved to build soap box derby cars when he was younger — was hit with a bullet that became lodged in his foot, his mother said in a tearful Facebook post.

"Please, I need everyone to pray for my son as he was involved in the mass shooting in Jacksonville," Annmarie Amadeo wrote on Facebook Sunday night. "He has a lodged bullet in his foot. That's all I know. Multiple people are dead ... suspect is dead. Please pray for all, especially my son George."

Amadeo, who just graduated from Middletown North this spring, reported on Twitter that he was about five feet away from the shooter and "my dad jumped on me."

Amadeo also said he was out of surgery and then said: "Thanks for your prayers."

"If I don't respond to your message it doesn't mean that I didn't see it; means the world to me," he said.

His Middletown North coach also wished him well.

Related: Jacksonville Mass Shooting: 3 Dead At Madden NFL Gaming Event

Amadeo was participating in a Madden 19 tournament, which was held at GLHF Game Bar in Jacksonville Landing, a shopping center in Jacksonville, according to his family. The tournament was massive, with a reported 15,000 people either competing or attending.

At about 1:30 p.m. Sunday, shots started to ring out in the venue. A 24-year-old Baltimore man, David Katz, has been identified as the gunman, the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office said. After Katz was knocked out of the competition, he returned to the bar with a gun and opened fire. He then turned the gun on himself, killing himself.

In addition to the shooter, two young men were killed: They are Eli Clayton, 22, of Woodland Hills, California, and Taylor Robinson, 27, of Ballard, West Virginia. Like Amadeo, both young men were contestants in the competition. Many have already donated to this GoFundMe page set up for the two young men, pictured below.

Eleven others were injured, including Middletown's Amadeo.

Amadeo had just graduated from Middletown High School North this past spring. He ran cross country for Middletown North. In 2015, when he was 14, he actually competed in a statewide soapbox derby competition held in New Brunswick, and took third place out of the entire state of New Jersey. Photos of Amadeo and that competition ran on Patch: Middletown Boy Places Third In Soap Box Derby

From there, Amadeo actually became something of a soap box derby aficionado, and went on to compete in an international competition in Akron, Ohio in 2016. At the time, he told a FiOs reporter that the reason his cars were so successful is because his mother and father helped him so much.

Katz used at least one handgun, the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office told reporters Sunday night.

According to Patch's original article on the shooting, a Twitch.tv livestream showed two gamers playing Madden when a red laser dot appears on the chest of one of the players. More than a dozen gunshots then ring out and at least one person screams in agony.

Witness Ryan Alemon told CNN he saw the gun laser. Everyone ran and ducked for cover when about 20 shots rang out, he said. Alemon ran and hid in a restroom for about 10 minutes.

"Everyone was just running and everyone was dropping because they were getting shot," he said, adding that he also heard people yelling for help.

Photo via City of New Brunswick Facebook page; Super Stock category at the 15th Annual New Jersey Soap Box Derby, 2015: third-place winner George Amadeo