Four children, aged 11 to 14-years-old, were injured in a hail of bullets Sunday after they got shot while driving around in a stolen car in Minnesota, police said, ABC News reported.
One of the children — a girl —was shot in the head and hospitalized, and was in critical but stable condition, Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said, the outlet reported. (RELATED: ‘They’re Shooting!’: Listen To Newscaster’s Play-By-Play As Cops Unleash Flurry Of Bullets Into Suspect’s Car)
Four children, ages 11 to 14 — who were driving around Minneapolis in a stolen car Sunday — were shot and wounded, one critically, when an assailant chasing them unleashed a barrage of gunfire on the vehicle, police said. https://t.co/0xUA5nM48g pic.twitter.com/hj6kSQTZA7
— ABC News (@ABC) August 19, 2024
The other three children — two boys and a girl — were treated for non-life-threatening injuries, O’Hara said, ABC News reported. A fifth minor was reportedly uninjured by the gunfire, according to the official. All injured juveniles were taken into custody, the police chief added, the outlet noted.
The officer reportedly alleged that an 11-year-old boy was driving the stolen car. “Four kids shot between [the ages] 11 and 14 is outrageous and everyone should be up in arms over it. The police are doing everything that we can in response to this, but we can’t keep responding after the fact,” O’Hara said, according to the outlet.
The police chief reportedly said that they are investigating what the shooter’s motive was and have not identified the assailant who sprayed the car “with fully automatic gunfire.” The police have collected at least 30 shell casings from the scene and suspect that the gunman fired more rounds that lodged themselves into the car itself, O’Hara added, according to the outlet.
The 11-year-old driver was not injured by the gunfire and was detained by police at the scene, O’Hara said, the outlet reported. The boy was reportedly later turned over to his parents, the police chief added. O’Hara alleged that a pair of the juveniles were arrested less than two weeks ago for being in a stolen car, according to the outlet. “We are failing to deter this behavior and, with that being said, we are failing these kids as well,” the police chief reportedly said.
O’Hara explained that such juvenile activity “has become more and more brazen” over the year and that “more serious crimes [were] more frequently committed by those individuals who were involved in the theft of these cars,” the outlet noted.
“What’s most notable over the course of the year is that while there’s fewer of these cars being stolen, the activity that these juveniles are involved with has become more and more brazen,” the police chief reportedly emphasized. “There has been more aggravated assaults, more robberies, more hit and runs, more serious crimes more frequently committed by those individuals who were involved in the theft of these cars.”