Police: 13-year-old boy shot in Wissinoming robbery attempt

A 13-year-old boy suffered a gunshot wound to the stomach when a gunman fired shots into the Wissinoming house where he lives during a robbery attempt Thursday night.

Police were called to Creston Street near Hawthorne at 7:51 p.m., and a 34-year-old man inside the house told them he was on the porch when two men approached him and announced a robbery, Chief Inspector Scott Small said. The man turned to run inside and shut the door as one of the robbers opened fire, firing three shots into the house, Small said.

One bullet found the boy, who was in the dining room at the time, and grazed him in the stomach, Small said. Medics took him to be treated for the graze wound at St. Christopher's Hospital for Children, and he was in stable condition later Thursday.

"Everyone in that house was lucky," Small said. He said police found three shell casings outside and bullet holes in the walls inside the house, as well as a small bag of a substance that appeared to be marijuana on the porch. The robbers escaped with nothing.

The suspects in the shooting were described in preliminary information released by police as a man about 5 feet 9 and thin with all black clothing and another about the same height wearing black clothing, but with a heavy build.

No arrests were made about 10 p.m., and police remained on the narrow block of porch-front rowhouses investigating.