Police seek help in identifying suspects in West Philly rec center shooting that injured 5, including two children
Gunfire erupted at the Christy Recreation Center on Wednesday afternoon as families gathered at the pool on a day when temperatures topped 90 degrees.
Philadelphia police are asking the public for help in identifying four people who they say were involved in a shooting at a West Philadelphia recreation center Wednesday that left five people injured, including a 10-year-old boy and an 11-year-old girl.
In surveillance footage released by police, four young men are seen walking down 56th Street and crossing Christian Street, then heading toward the Christy Recreation Center, where gunfire broke out shortly after 4 p.m., disrupting the peace of people trying to find respite at the pool from the day’s searing heat.
The pool had just recently opened, Mayor Cherelle L. Parker said.
In the footage, one young man is seen wearing a black head covering with hair sticking out from the front, a black T-shirt, black shorts, and white sneakers, and toting a black duffel bag. Another has cropped hair and is wearing a white T-shirt, black pants, and black sneakers. A third young man, also with cropped hair, is wearing a white T-shirt, light blue jeans, and white sneakers. A fourth is wearing a black hooded sweatshirt, light blue jeans, and black-and-red sneakers and carrying a dark-colored backpack.
Seconds after the group of four crossed the street in the direction of the rec center, the young man with the black head covering ran back down Christian Street, grabbed his duffel bag from the pavement, and appeared to pick something up from the street before running out of frame.
In footage from a different vantage point, the three other young men are seen running down Christian Street, toward Allison Street.
On a stiflingly hot day, many had gathered at the rec center pool to try to cool off when the gunfire erupted.
Police rushed the two youngest victims, who had graze wounds, to Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
A 16-year-old who had been shot multiple times was taken in a private vehicle to the Hospital of the University Pennsylvania-Cedar Avenue and was later transferred to Penn Presbyterian Medical Center, police said.
Another 16-year-old was shot and was in stable condition at Penn Presbyterian, police said, and a 32-year-old rec center worker suffered a graze wound.
Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel said there had been a fight earlier in the day at the rec center that was broken up by a police officer and rec center staff.
Some of those who were involved in the fight came back to the area and started shooting at people on 56th Street, not at people in the pool, he said.
No arrests have been made and a motive for the shooting was unclear.
The rec center will be closed for the rest of the week, but the pool at the center will reopen Saturday with its regular hours of 12 to 5 p.m., officials said.
Police and city officials strongly condemned the violence at a time when recent shootings have affected children.
On Saturday night, a 7-year-old girl sustained a graze wound to the head in a shooting that left two men dead in the city’s Nicetown section. The girl’s mother, 26, was shot several times and was hospitalized in stable condition, police said.
On July 24, gunfire at a graduation party in North Philadelphia left four people critically injured, including a 36-year-old woman and her two children.
Despite the recent spike in gun violence, Wednesday’s shooting came amid historic lows in shootings across the city and a continued drop in homicides.
As of Wednesday, there have been 134 homicides reported in Philadelphia, compared with 155 the same time last year, police data show. There have been 1,089 shooting incidents this year, compared with 1,349 the same time last year, and 604 shooting victims, down from last year’s 658, data show.
While shootings in the city have steadily decreased through the end of July, the percentage of shooting victims under the age of 18 has risen in the last two years, according to police data.
Through July 30, 13% of shooting victims were juveniles, data show. That number is more than double the percentage from a decade ago, data show.
Anyone with information on the rec center shooting is asked to call the department’s shooting investigations group at 215-686-8270/71 or to submit an anonymous tip at 215-686-8477.