A one-year-old boy was fatally shot in New York City on Sunday after gunmen opened fire at a cookout party in a park in Brooklyn, according to multiple reports.
The baby, Davell Gardner Jr., was sitting in his stroller when two men fired shots at the sidewalk party near the Raymond Bush Playground in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood, authorities said.
“The baby was with his family enjoying a Sunday night in the Summer when someone started shooting,” New York Police Department Chief of Community Affairs Jeffrey Maddrey wrote on Twitter.
Davell was reportedly shot in the stomach and rushed to a nearby hospital in critical condition, where the baby boy was pronounced dead shortly after.
“We as a community, we as a police department denounce this disgusting violence,” Maddrey said.
A one year old child is dead. The baby was with his family enjoying a Sunday night in the Summer when someone started shooting . Three people were injured and the baby was killed. This. Must.STOP! We as a community, we as a police department denounce this disgusting violence. pic.twitter.com/R66DVO6cTA
— Chief Jeffrey Maddrey (@NYPDCommAffairs) July 13, 2020
Besides Davell, three other people were also struck by gunfire and hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries. A 25-year-old man was reportedly shot in the ankle, a 36-year-old man in the leg, and a 27-year-old man in the groin. All of the victims are expected to survive, police said.
“These are the very real people affected by senseless gun violence,” NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea wrote on Twitter.
The shooting happened amid a recent uptick in gun violence in the city compared to June and July last year.
“In the beginning of the year, we saw an uptick in crime and shootings. We saw some leveling off for a few months in the beginning of the coronavirus crisis. Now, we’ve seen something very troubling in recent weeks,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said on June 22 during a press conference.
The mayor also addressed the Sunday night shooting during a press conference and called the violence “horrifying,” blaming the incident on the number of guns on the streets.
Nobody has been taken into custody in relation to the shooting at this time and the motive remains unclear, police said.
Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call the NYPD’s Crime Stoppers hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477), or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782). Tips can also be submitted via their website or on Twitter, @NYPDTips.