Outbreak Of Gun Violence In Philadelphia Leaves 2 People Dead, 10 Others Injured In 7 Separate Shootings
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - Twelve people were shot and at least two people were killed, after seven separate shootings overnight in Philadelphia. The shootings happened in less than a three-hour span.
The youngest victim is just 14 years old.
Police say just after 1 a.m. he was headed to a convenience store on the 2600 block of Germantown Avenue when five men tried to rob him. One of them shot the boy in the chest.
"The victim, after being shot, ran about a half a block to another business and that's where police found him," Philadelphia Police Chief Inspector Scott Small said.
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The wave of shootings began just before 10:30 p.m. Thursday with a shooting on the 3600 block of N. 21st Street. Police say a 45-year-old man was shot multiple times, including on his face and chest. He is currently in critical condition and is on a ventilator.
Minutes later, just after 10:45 p.m. there was a quadruple shooting on the 300 block of North 55th Street in West Philadelphia. Police say two men opened fire on a group of people sitting on a porch. The four victims range in age from 22 to 30. A 27-year-old man died in that shooting.
"One of the things that we definitely are doing is trying to be surgical, we don't want to hurt the community, but we also need to identify these males who are doing the shooting out here," Deputy Commissioner Melvin Singleton said.
A 37-year-old man was killed on the 5200 block of Wayne Avenue in Germantown around 11:15 p.m. Police found the man in the driver's seat of a car, with a gunshot wound to the neck. Shell casings at the scene indicate the gunman fired off at least 13 shots.
Small said the man had just left a friend's apartment nearby.
"It appears that right after he was shot, he lost control and crashed into a parked, unattended vehicle," Small said.
Just before midnight, a man was shot in the chest and stomach on the 1600 block of South Conestoga Street in Kingsessing. Officers rushed him to Penn Presbyterian Hospital.
Three people are recovering after a triple shooting around midnight on the 1300 block of South Ringgold Street in Point Breeze. A 52-year-old woman was inside her home when a bullet grazed her thigh.
Two young men, ages 22 and 18, were shot in the legs.
At around 12:30 a.m., police responded to a shooting near the intersection of 12th and Huntingdon Street. Officers transported a 27-year-old man to Temple Hospital with gunshot wounds to his legs.
No one has been arrested in any of the shootings, although there is surveillance video of at least one of the incidents.
"We're doing our best to get our arms around the problem," Mayor Jim Kenney said.
At a news conference addressing the shooting of an off-duty police officer this morning, Mayor Jim Kenney says the city is working hard to address the gun violence plaguing our neighborhoods.
"Those shootings last night were all over the city," Kenney said. "They were in all different parts, not only just our pinpoint areas that we've been concentrating on, but in many different parts. So I don't have an answer. We're going to keep working hard at it."
