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By Phil Helsel and Austin Mullen
At least five people, including two children, were shot and wounded Saturday at a family gathering in Chicago, police and a fire official said.
The shooting occurred around 6:20 p.m. in the West Englewood neighborhood, police told NBC Chicago.
Chicago Fire spokesman Larry Langford said one of the children was shot in the chest and the other in the leg. Three other people were also shot and taken to hospitals, he said.
A witness to the aftermath of the shooting, Lamon Reccord, told NBC Chicago that “I can’t get it out of my head.”
“This boy, he was at least no older than 10 years old, and he was literally in front of my feet with a gunshot wound to his chest, and his mother was just putting pressure on him,” he said.
Langford said the child shot in the chest was saved by paramedics at the scene. NBC Chicago, citing authorities, reported that a 10-year-old girl was shot in the shin, and an 8-year-old boy in the chest, and they were in stable condition.
Chicago Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi tweeted that the shooting occurred at a family gathering. He tweeted that “Individuals on scene are not being cooperative with detectives.”
More details about how many people were shot or their conditions were not immediately available.
Reccord, 20, was upset over the shooting and told NBC Chicago that he has lost many friends to gun violence.
“We shouldn’t be so used to this — this shouldn’t be normal,” he said
He said he saw a young girl carried out of a house with what appeared to be a gunshot wound to her leg, and another woman who appeared to be shot in the arm.
NBC Chicago reported the other victims were a 29-year-old woman shot in the shoulder and chest area who was taken to a hospital in critical condition; a 42-year-old man hit twice in the hip; a 23-year-old man shot in the left foot; and a 28-year-old man in the right shoulder.
Dennis Tabb, who works for an anti-violence organization, told the station the gathering was a baby shower and people he knew attended so he went to the scene.
“It’s heartbreaking,” said Tabb, who said he has been in the community for 50 years.
In January, preliminary numbers released by the Chicago Police Department showed that murders decreased in the city in 2018 for the second straight year, following a surge in violence in 2016.
There were 561 murders in 2018, compared to 660 the previous year.
In 2016, there were 777 murders, making it one of Chicago’s most violent years since the mid-1990s, NBC Chicago has reported.