Police search for suspects after sisters shot at Toronto playground

TORONTO — A close-knit Toronto community was questioning the safety they once took for granted as police searched Friday for a man who sprayed bullets into a local park, injuring two young sisters as they played.

While residents struggled to come to terms with the gun violence that sent the girls aged five and nine to hospital, the city’s mayor pledged “swift justice” for those responsible and said the perpetrators had no place in Toronto society.

The brazen daylight shooting was the latest in a recent string of gun crimes in the city, several of which have taken place in bustling areas.

In the east Toronto neighbourhood where the girls were hit by bullets intended for another target, residents said they were focused on the impact the shooting would have on the community they no longer see as safe.

“This is where they play every day, right next to where they live,” Grace Ballantyne, a longtime resident said of the small park where 11 children were playing around 5 p.m. Thursday. “I was shocked.”

Toronto’s mayor had harsh words for the perpetrators as well as anyone involved in gang activity, which police say has spiked slightly in recent months.

John Tory, who decried the attack as “unacceptable” and “cowardly,” said he hopes to see “swift justice” for those involved.

“Those who would fire into a playground full of kids playing with so little care don’t deserve to be among us here in the society that we’re building ... in our country,” he said. “And I say that, too, to all of those involved in ... the gang subculture and the guns. You will be caught, you will face the full weight of the justice system, and you will not terrorize our city and our neighbourhoods that are within it.”

The two girls are now in stable condition.