9th death reported from Travis Scott Astroworld tragedy

James Lassiter, attorney for concert victim’s family: “At 6:50 last night, Bharti Shahani lost her battle from the horrific, horrific injuries that she sustained at the Astroworld festival. Bharti was, let me say this – we’re here today to talk about Bharti. We’re not going to entertain any questions about the fact or events that led up to why we are here today. That’s going to be for another time.”

Namrata Shahani, concert victim’s sister: “We were holding hands that night. I was there with her. I was holding her hand and once that happened, the next time I saw her she was in the ER, unconscious, on a ventilator.”

Karishma Shahani, concert victim’s mother: “You know what was the name of Bharti? Bharti was love. Only giving. Only giving. She don’t ask nothing. Whatever I tell Bharti, yes Mama. Bharti help me at the store? Yes, Mama. She will sit late night, studying, most focused. Only As and Bs. No Cs, uh-uh, never. No hanging around, no. Very nice, I am blessed, God gave me, you know, blessing. What happened now? What happened to our blessing now?”

Chief Troy Finner, Houston Police Department: “The  ultimate authority to end a show is with production and the entertainer, OK? And that should be through communication with public safety officials.”

“Let me clarify something, I’m glad you asked that: I’m a 54-year-old man, 32 years on this. I meet a lot of people. I was born and raised in here in Houston. So, if you if somebody is referring to a special relationship, if you call meeting him twice a ‘special relationship,’ and I’m not being smart, I just want to be open and transparent. That’s not a close relationship to me. I’ve only spoken to him twice. So, let’s let’s put that to rest. Next question.”

Journalist: “Chief, when was the last time you spoke to Travis Scott or his team, and is there a focus of the criminal investigation on anything he did or didn’t do?”

Finner: “I’m not going to speak to that. I told you, I just told you, I’ve met him twice.”

Journalist: “But was the second time afterward or have you spoken to this team since?”

Finner: “No, no. Before the concert.”

Journalist: “Can you say why you haven’t turned things over to the EPS, to the Texas Rangers or to the FBI?”

Finner: “Because I’m really confident who we are here at HPD, and I think we can do our own investigation. And let’s not jump ahead of things. We’re only a few days into this, and I’m pretty confident of what our investigators are doing already.”

“I’m telling you as chief of police, this is my agency, we’re going to hold people accountable. And I think that the family, we owe that to them. And people have to understand, that’s why we’re moving with this investigation and and doing the best job that we can do on it. We owe that to them. We owe it to the city. We owe it to our nation, and we need to learn lessons from this.”