A suburb outside Chicago has canceled its annual carnival after a large group of teens disrupted the event, authorities said.
The four-day carnival in Posen had been held at Commissioners Park on West 148th Street and was a draw for thousands of visitors. This year, however, an unruly crowd caused enough concern over public safety that police shut down the event and town leaders canceled the festivities indefinitely.
The Posen Police Department announced Sunday evening that a large fight at the carnival forced authorities into making “the difficult decision to shut it down for the safety of all attendees.”
Police said several arrests were made in connection with the altercation.
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The fight followed an incident that happened at the carnival on Thursday night.
In that incident, police said about 20 juveniles were involved in a disturbance after leaving the carnival grounds. A loaded handgun was recovered from the backpack of one juvenile, who was charged with felony unlawful use of a weapon and transported to the juvenile detention center.
On Tuesday night, Posen’s Park District voted unanimously to cancel the carnival indefinitely, FOX32 Chicago reported.
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Posen Mayor Frank Podbielniak told the station that he estimated the disruptive crowd that caused the chaos had swelled to about 400 young people.
“It was just a flash mob. They came to create chaos. That’s what happened,” Podbielniak told FOX32 Chicago.
Two teens and two adults were arrested in connection with the disturbances, the station reported. Officials believe that teens from outside the town learned about the event on social media before descending on the small community.
The cancellation of the carnival follows a similar incident that happened last summer in Tinley Park, another Chicago suburb.
Tinley Park officials had canceled its Armed Forces Carnival after a flash mob of 400 teens descended onto the suburb and began fighting with each other.
