A 3-year-old boy was shot Monday evening while playing outside his family’s apartment building on Chicago’s South Side.
Marshawn Williams, who was hit in the shoulder area, was in fair condition at the University of Chicago Comer Children’s Hospital, spokeswoman Catherine Gianaro said Monday night.
The shooting occurred about 6:15 p.m. near West 77th and South May Streets in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood. Witnesses said they saw a man they thought was the boy’s father take his shirt off and cover the boy’s wound to stop the bleeding.
After the shooting, other witnesses said, the boy was being held by his mother, who is pregnant. “My son has been shot! My son has been shot!” they heard her saying.
No one else was hit by the gunfire, but witnesses said several children were playing outside during the time of the shooting.
Tanya Williams said her two children were playing outside of her home, just north from where the shooting happened. She said she was on the porch of her home when she heard about five or six shots.
She told her children to run inside their home, Williams said.
“I cried when I saw the little boy who got shot because I have a 2-year-old [girl],” Williams, 22, said. “It could have been my baby.”
Williams said her children always want to be outside playing in the warm weather. She said if her children want to play outside, she plans to keep them closer to the house and within her sight.
Four people were being questioned about the shooting, Chicago police spokeswoman Monique Bond said. It does not appear the boy was the intended target, she said.
“There is some information that gang intelligence [officers] obtained that suggests the shooting may have been gang-related,” Bond said. She declined to elaborate on that information.
Marshawn’s family declined to comment at the hospital.
Jamar Brown, 20, said he knew Marshawn William’s father, well, and said the man, who was known as “Twin,” was working and was not involved in gangs.
“It’s real sad to see a little kid hurt like that,” he said. “It was real messed up.”
Chanika Clark, 26, said her two children were also playing outside when the shots rang out. Clark ran and called 911 from her cell phone.
“We have a nice block,” she said, echoing the comments of others who were shocked at Monday night’s shooting.
Monday’s shooting comes two days after a 5-year-old boy accidentally shot himself in the head at his family’s South Side apartment in the Washington Park neighborhood.
The boy’s parents were charged with endangering the life and health of a child, a misdemeanor. The father was also charged with possessing a firearm without a Firearm Owner’s Identification Card and failing to register a firearm, also misdemeanors.
Police said the boy was shot about 6 p.m. Saturday after finding a revolver in a bedroom before being transported to Comer Children’s Hospital, where he was last reported in critical condition.
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