WINSTON-SALEM—Three teenagers in North Carolina have been charged with murder after a 5-year-old was shot and killed in what police say was a drive-by shooting.
Winston-Salem Police say the boy was shot in the head while he was in his apartment on Cole Ridge Circle, off Cole Road.
Police say the shooters appeared to be firing randomly and that three separate apartments were struck.
The child was sitting down with his family upstairs playing when he was struck by a bullet in the head. No one else was injured in the incident.
The boy was in surgery at Wake Forest Baptist Health, but died around 8 p.m., police say.
Police arrested three teenagers later Saturday. Police identified 17-year-old Oscar Mendez-Rodriguez as one of those arrested. A 14-year-old and 15-year-old are also charged but were not publicly identified. The investigation is ongoing.
Police said it was the 13th homicide in the city so far this year, compared to 12 at the same point last year.
Murders and Violent crimes
The number of murders and violent crimes committed in the United States dropped slightly in 2017, according to new crime statistics released in September 2018.
“Crime declined nationwide last year, consistent with our earlier analyses of 2017 data in the nation’s 30 largest cities,” Ames Grawert, senior counsel for the Justice Program at the Brennan Center for Justice in New York, told the Washington Times.
“That’s the good news. The bad news is that even while crime is falling, the number of Americans incarcerated remains near-record highs. Now is the time to address the problem.”
The number of cases of manslaughter and murder dropped 0.7 percent in 2017 from the prior year, the report said.
The CNN Wire contributed to this article.
