Ohio This article is more than 2 months old

Boy, 11, killed in Cincinnati drive-by shooting into crowd of children

This article is more than 2 months old

Outrage and horror after 22 rounds fired in incident in which four other children and one adult injured

Cincinnati officials are expressing outrage and horror at a drive-by shooting that sent more than a score of bullets into a crowd of children, killing an 11-year-old boy and striking four other children and an adult.

The boy was identified on Monday by the Hamilton county coroner’s office as Dominic Davis.

Members of the boy’s family had attended a press conference with investigators held on Sunday and had urged whoever was responsible for the shooting to turn themselves in.

The city’s police chief, Terri Theetge, told reporters on Sunday that an occupant of a sedan fired 22 rounds “in quick succession” into a crowd of children just before 9.30pm on Friday on the city’s West End. A 53-year-old woman was hit along with the boy who died; three other boys aged 12, 13 and 15; and a 15-year-old girl. One victim remained hospitalized in stable condition.

Mayor Aftab Pureval called the shooting “sickening and unimaginable” and said it occurred in a vibrant neighborhood next to a local park and near a historic elementary school.

“Twenty-two rounds were fired,” Pureval said. “Twenty-two rounds in a moment – into a crowd of kids. No time to respond. No time to react.”

Pureval said the neighborhood was suffering “unimaginable trauma”. On Saturday and on Sunday morning, he said, people were “shouting messages of love and support to each other through open windows, but they were too wary to go outside”.

“The parents, and the kids themselves we talked to, don’t feel safe, and I frankly can’t blame them,” he said.

Theetge said it was too early to say whether the shooting was random or targeted, and she declined to discuss other aspects of the investigation. She urged whoever was responsible to turn themselves in, vowing “we will find you and we will bring you to justice.”

Isaac Davis, the father of the child who was killed, was at the news conference along with the boy’s mother and grandmother and also urged whoever was responsible to come forward.

“When will this stop? Will this ever stop?” Davis asked. “How many people have to bury their kids, their babies, their loved ones?”

The mayor said 40% of the illegal weapons on the city’s streets were stolen from cars, and he and the city manager urged gun owners to lock up their weapons. He decried both the ubiquity of guns and the “inability to resolve differences peacefully”.

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