PHILADELPHIA (AP) - The sound of gunfire was heard amid the sound of fireworks on the Fourth of July weekend in Philadelphia as police reported more than two dozen shootings and seven deaths.
Gunfire claimed the lives of a 6-year-old and a 15-year-old in different parts of the city, and a number of double- and triple-shootings were reported.
Police say a family member brought a 6-year-old boy to Jefferson-Torresdale Hospital on Sunday afternoon with a gunshot wound to the left side of his chest, and the child was pronounced dead minutes later.
Fifteen-year-old Angelo Walker was killed and two men wounded in a west Philadelphia shooting at 8:20 p.m. Sunday. Also in west Philadelphia, a 19-year-old man was shot and killed shortly before 11 p.m. Sunday.
In northeast Philadelphia, a 37-year-old woman shot a dozen times was pronounced dead shortly after 2:30 p.m. Sunday. Less than an hour later in south Philadelphia, 27-year-old Albert Lee was killed and another man was wounded.
At about 4:45 p.m. Sunday in north Philadelphia, 43-year-old Abdul Lamar Davis was found on the street with gunshot wounds to the back of the head, face and body and was pronounced dead at the scene. In northeast Philadelphia just before 6:30 p.m. Sunday, 22-year-old Kevin Selby died of multiple gunshot wounds and another man was wounded.
In south Philadelphia, 24-year-old Ahmad Morales was shot and killed shortly before 7:30 p.m. Friday.
Police reported 210 homicides as of midnight Sunday, a 27 percent increase over the total as of that date last year - a year that ended with the highest homicide total in the city in more than a decade.
Mayor Jim Kenney called the weekend “a stark reminder that COVID-19 isn’t our only crisis. Gun violence continues to traumatize our communities and cut lives short.”
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