INDIANAPOLIS — Indianapolis was plagued by more shootings over the weekend throughout the city.
Among them was a teenage girl who was shot on the east side Sunday morning near an Amoco gas station on East Washington Street just after 3:00 in the morning. Police say they don’t have a suspect yet in the shooting.
There was also a man shot and killed early Saturday morning near the intersection of West 26th and Martin Luther King, Jr Blvd on the near north side. Again, police have not been able to find a suspect yet in that shooting.
Two other fatal shootings happened. One near Southeastern Ave. and South Hunter Road on the southeast side and the other on the west side just west of Lynhurst and Washington Street. There were also three other non-fatal shootings that occurred.
In all, there were seven shootings throughout the city between Friday and Sunday, with three people having been killed.
The shootings come after a tumultuous time for Indy city leaders as three Dutch soldiers were shot at in a drive-by shooting the previous weekend. One of the soldiers died. Nevertheless, Mayor Joe Hogsett has continued to push the fact that the number of homicides and murders in Indianapolis is down compared to this time last year.
“Even though the numbers are down, as far as non-fatal shootings, homicides, and criminal homicides, the numbers are still way too high,” said Rev. Charles Harrison, leader of the Indy Ten Point Coalition.
“I try to focus on those non-fatal shootings and stabbings that we are seeing and they are still very high, and I think we still have a lot of work to do.”
Harrison tells Indy Politics that much of the violence this year has been perpetrated by younger people, namely teenagers.
“We are seeing more juveniles with guns,” he said. “I haven’t, in my 23 years in doing this kind of work, seen as many juveniles carrying weapons openly like I’ve seen this year.”
Harrison believes this increase in the number of teenagers with guns has led to crime becoming more widespread throughout the city, extending beyond what he called Indy’s “traditional high crime areas.”
He blames a breakdown in culture, music, and video games as the main reasons why more teenagers are committing violence. Harrison also attributes the violence to a “breakdown in the black family.”
