People attending the cockfight ran into the brush when shots rang out shortly after midnight at the rural property near La Blanca, about 15 miles northeast of McAllen. Hidalgo County Sheriff Lupe Trevino said officers are hunting for the gunmen.
Detectives and crime scene technicians picked over the site. The ground was littered with beer cans and cups, near a low corrugated metal pavilion with wooden bleachers where the cockfights took place.
The property is located in a rural area crisscrossed by dirt roads where packs of dogs chase infrequent cars and tractors rumble between fields. A narrow dirt drive leads back through a fence posted with a no trespassing sign and past a small, low-slung, unoccupied white home. Further back, a ramshackle trailer blocks the line of sight.
Trevino told KRGV-TV that the cockfighting site was large and well established, with concession stands and bleachers.
The sheriff's office set up a mobile command center opposite a watermelon field.
Sheriff's dispatcher Gloria Felix said investigators do not know what prompted the shootings. Felix had no details on conditions of the wounded nor how many people were at the cockfight.
