EDIT: BPM Festival’s organizers have released the following statement, which contradicts some of what Culham’s account had conveyed:

Multiple shootings have reportedly taken place at BPM Festival in Playa del Carmen, Mexico. The evening of January 15th marked the final day of the house and techno-centric gathering, and the incidents – which have injured at least 12 and claimed the lives of at least five as of this writing – took place early morning today, January 16th, as the festivities wrapped up.

EDM.com’s Devin Culham had been feet away from one of the shooters. After finding her way to safety, she spoke to djbios to deliver a firsthand account of what she witnessed. She told us:

Basically, we were at Blue Parrot, my friend and I. We were going to the bathroom near the back, where there was an exit. It was a pretty packed club; it was the Elrow party, the last party of the festival. We were walking to the bathroom and heard a shot fire so we all ducked to the ground.

I looked up and there was a Mexican man with a white shirt, blue jeans and a black baseball cap with what looked to me like a revolver in his hand. I saw him shoot four or five shots in the air, and we’d all ducked to the ground. The music was still going and nobody knew what was going on, and we got up and found our friends and tried to run to the beach. Everybody dove down so we all ducked down again for a second. We ran out the artist door and kind of went through a back exit of the club. As we were leaving, there were police everywhere and there was another crime scene that another person had done so it looks like there were multiple shootings.

There were rumors that there were shootings at The Jungle, which is another venue. We heard rumors that there were shootings at the Thompson Hotel. My guess is that this is likely cartel related, that it’s some sort of drug territory thing because there’s so much open drug dealing – but I’m not sure.

This article will be updated further as additional information becomes available.