3 children injured in shootings in 3 weeks

Three young children have been hospitalized after two shootings in the past three weeks.

A stray bullet grazed the side of an 8-year-old boy sleeping in his house in the 1800 block of South 5th Street late Tuesday night. On Aug. 11, two girls, 5 and 10, were shot during a party in Weinland Park in the 1200 block of Summit Street.

Chad Conley, 36, father of the 8-year-old, Edward Dodson, was on the first floor of his two-story house when he heard what sounded like a bullet striking a dresser in his son’s room about 11:20 p.m. Tuesday. He rushed upstairs to his son’s bedroom to find that the child had been wounded.

Conley frantically called 911, and paramedics arrived to take Edward to Nationwide Children’s Hospital.

“My son was shot,” he told a dispatcher. “Please send an ambulance, pretty please.”

Later in the evening, Conley said, he learned that the injury was relatively minor. He compared it to a rug burn Wednesday morning.

“He said this morning it wasn’t even sore,” Conley said of his son.

Still, he said, it could have been much worse.

“The doctor said if it had been a hair closer (to his body), it would have shattered his ribs,” Conley said.

Toliea Jack, 32, was shot on the sidewalk outside the residence Tuesday night. Paramedics took her to a hospital with a gunshot wound to her right lower leg, police said in a news release Wednesday. The injury was not life-threatening.

Conley said the gunman fired from a car driving along South 5th Street.

Danautica Wilson, 5, and Elaya King, 10, were two of four people injured late in the evening of Aug. 11 when a gunman opened fire on a gathering in Weinland Park, police said.

Paramedics rushed Danautica to Nationwide Children’s Hospital with a gunshot wound to her leg. Three other victims, including Elaya, were taken in private cars to Ohio State University’s Wexner Medical Center. All four victims survived. Several of Conley’s neighbors stopped by to ask if his son was OK as he spoke with a reporter Wednesday morning. The Columbus man said he’s lived in the same neighborhood on the South Side for most of his life.

Crime is common in his community, he said, but Tuesday night marked the first time a member of his family had been victimized.

“This is crazy,” he said.