2 people, including 10-year-old boy, shot in Sheraden
A 10-year-old was taken to the hospital in stable condition, and a 19-year-old was rushed by ambulance in serious condition after two shootings just after 9:30 Monday night in the city’s Sheraden neighborhood.
Neighbors tell Channel 11 there was a block party earlier in the evening, and they believe that spilled over into a violent night on Zephyr and Sherwood avenues.
“I try to come out early, but you don’t know,” a mom with two boys tells Channel 11. “They do it in the morning, too. You don’t know. Sometimes on the Fourth of July, you don’t know if it’s fireworks or gunshots.”
Tuesday morning, medical gloves littered the ground, and crime scene tape was stuffed into a trash can. At 9:30 Monday night, a 10-year-old was shot in the arm inside a house after police say they got a ShotSpotter alert for 14 rounds fired. Just steps away on Sherwood Avenue, a 19-year-old was also found wounded.
“I’m very concerned about the kids, the neighborhood. You don’t even want to sit on your porch anymore to be honest with you,” a neighbor adds.
Richard Garland leads Pittsburgh’s Violence Prevention Initiative and works at the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Public Health. He works with the city and with victims of gun violence. Mr. Garland calls this epidemic of shootings a disease.
“Access to guns is the thing that is hurting us,” Garland tells Channel 11. “We cannot not look at what the pandemic has done. It’s about mental health; we’re not talking about mental health issues. When I talk to different gunshot wound victims, they’re depressed.”
Garland says we need to get kids in educational and extracurricular programs year-round and away from drugs, alcohol and social media.
“I believe we as a community can heal our own community,” Garland adds. “I want to make it the safest place for a kid to come home to.”
Mayor Ed Gainey spoke out on social media, saying the city is committed to finding those who did this and holding them responsible. He added all families and kids should feel safe at home or in their neighborhoods. He called on voters to send a message to Harrisburg to fight for common-sense gun control legislation.
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