After a three-year-old was shot in Minneapolis, community members and activists are calling for an end to the gun violence that has injured three children and killed two in the city.
“We’re demolishing our own people,” said Minneapolis resident Belinda Hoover, according to KSTP. “We’re destroying children’s lives.”
As of June 24, 83% of shooting victims in Minneapolis were black and 81% were male. The 17-21 age group accounts for the most victims.
Hoover said it’s time to rise “above the violence” in Minneapolis and stop the fatal shootings.
Bishop Harding Smith of the Spiritual Church of God reiterated that the city’s residents are “sick and tired” of children being injured by gunfire.
“We are sick and tired of the shootings of our young boys and girls,” Smith said.
Rev. Jerry McAfee with New Salem Missionary Baptist Church questioned why “everything ends with gunplay” and called on the community to be more responsible.
“The community has to take a greater role … of dealing with the painful, traumatic things that exist within our own community,” McAfee said.
Minneapolis resident Lisa Clemons was around Emerson Avenue North Friday night where the shooting occurred. She said the gunshots “sounded like we were going to war.”
“We are living right now in the wild, wild west that is being called Minneapolis,” Clemons continued.
Clemons also called on the public to come together and “be united as a people,” KSTP reported.
Minneapolis Police Chief Medaria Arradondo said in a press conference following the shooting that children should never be wounded by gunfire, and they “are our most precious resources.”
Arradondo also noted that police are not the greatest threat to the city or to the African-American community: “We have an epidemic right now of unequivocal gun violence, particularly in our African-American communities. And that must stop.”
Police have leads on suspects in the Friday night shooting on Emerson Avenue but have made no arrests.
No arrests have been made in any of the child shootings in Minneapolis over the last two months.
Rose Williams
Rose Williams is an assistant editor for Alpha News.
