10 shot in 24 hours in KC, including 3-year-old and three hurt in Westport gun battle
Ten people were shot in less than 24 hours in Kansas City Tuesday and Wednesday, including a 3-year-old boy injured at a home on the east side and three people who were hurt in a rolling gun battle in Westport.
Police responded to seven shootings within a period of just nine of those hours.
Police Chief Rick Smith wrote about some of the shootings in a blog post Wednesday afternoon, describing where and when they unfolded. Soon after, when the triple shooting in Westport was reported, Mayor Quinton Lucas posted a message on Twitter, saying he was disappointed to hear of it.
“Makes clear why we also need to expand who we talk to,” Lucas wrote. “For meeting our crime grp first mtg, I’m asking those who have been in and out of trouble, who have been victims & assailants to participate in helping.”
All of the victims survived. Two were admitted to a hospital with life-threatening injuries.
“Unfortunately, nights like last night have not been unusual lately,” Smith wrote of the rash of shootings Tuesday night. Shootings have been steadily increasing in the city, he said.
As of Monday, Kansas City totaled 204 nonfatal shootings, Smith said. This time last year there were 160.
As of Thursday, 69 people have been slain in the city this year, according to data kept by The Star, which includes fatal police shootings.
By that time last year, which ended with 153 killings, there had been 52.
7 shootings in 9 hours
The first in a spate of seven shootings unfolded about 8:45 p.m. Tuesday near E 31st Street and Van Brunt Boulevard.
A male was hospitalized in critical condition; a female was hospitalized in stable condition, Smith said. The suspects in the case are between the ages of 14 and 17.
Just before midnight, a man arrived at an emergency room with a gunshot wound to the shoulder after he was shot near Linwood Boulevard and Kensington Avenue.
Just after midnight Wednesday morning, police arrived at a shots fired call in the 500 block of E. 105th Street, where a 15-year-old girl said a bullet was fired in her direction. She was not injured.
About 40 minutes later, police were called to a drive-by shooting in the 3600 block of Bales Avenue where they found more than 160 shell casings from at least five different guns littering the ground.
“Miraculously, no one was injured,” Smith wrote, adding that children as young as two lived in the home.
Just before 1 a.m., police were again dispatched to a hospital where a shooting victim had arrived at the emergency room with a gunshot wound to the stomach. He was taken into surgery with life-threatening injuries.
Less than an hour later, an 18-year-old drove himself to the emergency room with a gunshot wound to the neck, police said. He was in stable condition. Police said his injuries may be related to the shooting in the 3600 block of Bales Avenue.
About 5:45 a.m. police found a man in his 40s driving a moped who had been shot at the plasma center at 6000 Independence Avenue, Smith said. He sustained life-threatening injuries.
4 more shooting victims follow
In the hours that followed, four more people, including one child, were hospitalized with gunshot wounds.
Three people were shot about 3:45 p.m. Wednesday during a rolling gun battle in the Westport area, near West 40th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, police said.
Officers arriving to the scene found two vehicles with occupants shooting at each other nearby. The vehicles drove away, still firing.
A teenager was among the victims. Two adults were also shot; one appeared to be an “unintended victim,” police said.
A couple hours later, just before 6 p.m., a three-year-old boy was shot at a home in the 2300 block of Chelsea Avenue, police said. He was hospitalized in stable condition.
2020 shooting data
In May alone, there have been four double homicides in Kansas City.
“I get asked a lot why this is happening and what can be done to stop it,” Smith wrote. “I wish we had all of those answers.”
He said in most of the seven shootings called in over nine hours, officers were either close enough to hear the gunshots or only a couple minutes away.
“Police presence is not deterring those set on committing violent acts,” Smith wrote.
Eight of the ten people shot between May 11 and Sunday refused to cooperate with police or declined to press charges, he said, adding that about two-thirds of the recent nonfatal shooting victims in the city don’t cooperate with the investigation.
“If shooting victims don’t help police stop shooters, the shooters remain in the community and remain readily capable of deadly violence,” Smith wrote. “We know who they are. We know what they’ve done, but we have no way to stop them within the criminal justice system.”
Smith said he plans to discuss new violent crime prevention initiatives the department is undertaking next week.
“We live here, too, and so do our families,” he wrote. “We want a safer Kansas City. We want a quiet night for all of our neighborhoods. We can’t do that alone.”
In recent weeks, Lucas announced the appointment of five members to a new Public Safety Study Group in an effort to reconcile Kansas City’s persistent violence.
Lucas set a Sept. 30 deadline for the study group to present their recommendations to him. Then, Lucas said, he plans to introduce ordinances to the city council or legislative action to the Kansas City Board of Police Commissioners, of which he is a member.
Gun violence will be the subject of a new, statewide journalism project The Star is undertaking in Missouri this year in partnership with the national service program Report for America. As part of this project, The Star will seek the community’s help.
To contribute, visit Report for America online at reportforamerica.org.
