3-year-old boy shot in Baltimore

Police: Child in critical but stable condition; no charges stated

The 3-year-old boy shot Friday in the Brooklyn Homes in South Baltimore is in critical but stable condition, police said Monday.

The child’s name has not been released, nor have the names of his parents, and no charges have been announced. A spokesperson for the Baltimore City State’s Attorney’s Office did not respond to questions.

A Baltimore Police sergeant rushed the boy to the hospital after being flagged down about 9:50 p.m. Friday in the 700 block of E. Patapsco Ave., police said. The child’s parents refused to cooperate with investigators, who obtained a search warrant for their home nearby in the 800 block of Clintwood Court, police said.

Detectives found no gun inside the home, but they found evidence of a shooting, which they believe was accidental, police said.

Dried drops of blood remained on the threshold of the unit’s front door Monday, and neighbors described the gutwrenching realization of what had occurred.

A middle-aged neighbor, who declined to give his name out of safety concerns, said he heard three gunshots and sobbing, and saw the child’s father carry him out the door.

The gunshots sounded muffled, he said, but “any one of us could have been hit.”

“Parents need to make sure if they have a weapon, that it’s unloaded and out of reach of children, so no risk will come to them or others,” he said.

Ely Cox, a 41-year-old man who also lives nearby, said he moved to the Brooklyn Homes from Edmondson Village about two years ago.

The shooting made him want to move again to keep his 8-yearold stepdaughter safe, he said.

“I gotta get her out of this area,” he said. “Bad stuff happens everywhere. But it don’t happen as much as it does in the ghetto.”

Another neighbor, Shawn Robinson, 45, said the “fat, cute little boy” sometimes played outside with his older brother or sat on the front steps and sipped on a bottle of water “like an old man.”

She said she didn’t know his name. The boy’s family moved into the unit around January, said Robinson, who has lived in Brooklyn Homes about two years.

“It’s sad to hear,” she said. “I still can’t believe it.”