APALACHICOLA NATIONAL FOREST — The Franklin County Sheriff’s Office has identified the man they allege shot and killed one man and seriously wounded another in a shooting incident Thursday at a Rainbow Gathering in the Apalachicola National Forest.
Capt. Chester Creamer confirmed Tuesday the alleged shooter is Clark Mayers, 39, of Milledgeville, Georgia. He remains hospitalized at Tallahassee Memorial Hospital, with a sheriff”s deputy monitoring his room as a security precaution.
The man killed in the shooting has been confirmed by representatives of the Rainbow Gathering as Jacob Cardwell, from Golden Valley, Arizona, believed to be in his late 20s. He went by the nickname “Smiley.”
Remaining in critical condition at Tallahassee Memorial is Wesley Jones, 24, who goes by the name “Dice.”
Funds have been set up on gofundme.com on behalf of helping to offset Jones’ medical bills, as well as to help Cardwell’s family cover the cost of returning him to Arizona.
Creamer said the incident at the end of Wright Lake Road is believed to have taken place around a campfire and that alcohol was a factor.
Rainbow Gatherings are annual meetings of the Rainbow Family of the Living Light, a loosely defined collection of people associated with hippie culture. They had to vacate when the area was temporarily closed after the shooting.
The original Rainbow Gathering was in 1972, and it has been replicated throughout the year in regional gatherings, often in national forests.