A 1-year-old girl underwent surgery Tuesday at Children’s Memorial Hospital after being shot in the head in Chicago. The girl was walking a dog with her 15-year-old aunt near 84th street and Muskegon Avenue at about 8:10 AM when young men nearby began firing.
A man was bicycling near the area where the shootings occurred when the young men began to fire. They began to shoot at the bicyclist, who managed to get away.
The young girls aunt got on the ground and tried to shield the child until the firing stopped. She soon discovered that the child had “visible trauma” to her head.
Residents of the neighborhood told reporters that they had a gang problem, so gunfire was normal in the area.
“I don’t like living here,” one witness said. “It’s dangerous for people, especially for kids these days, because they might get shot or killed.”
One mother in the area was walking her 5-year-old son to school when the gunfire started. “Now he’s saying he doesn’t even want to go back to school,” she told the paper. “He’s scared, he’s afraid. He hears shots everyday, but he was never in the crossfire until today, going to school.”
This is not a new problem for kids in Chicago. It has been particularly bad these past few weeks. There have been several children killed or wounded recently. Included, but not limited to, the fatal shooting of Joseph Prince and wounding of DeShawn McKenzie Sunday, Both shootings happened while there was a anti-violence march in Englewood in response to shooting of Charinez Jefferson, who was pregnant. The child was delivered successfully but is in critical condition.
Are we looking at a rise in gang violence? Is there any way to counter it? Only time will tell.
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