Rash of child killings angers St. Louis leaders

ST. LOUIS (AP) – The gunfire that has long haunted St. Louis streets has taken an even more disturbing turn, with a rash of shootings involving children that has left the city’s police chief angered and frustrated by the lack of cooperation of witnesses.

Four children died from gunfire over the past week and two others were injured. Those killed included girls ages 3 and 11, along with a 16year-old boy and a 16-year-old girl. The injured were girls ages 5 and 6. All six victims were black.

Police Chief John Hayden told The Associated Press Friday that it appears that some of the children were hit by gunfire intended for adults who were near the kids.

“What we’re learning in our investigations is that there have been previous confrontations and other things that led to the incidents where the children are injured,” Hayden said.

Making matters worse, the chief said, was the lack of cooperation from the targeted adults. No arrests have been made in any of the recent shootings.

“The common denominator, the thing that frustrates me the most, is the fact that the adults and others of age are less than fully cooperative with our investigators,” Hayden said.

FBI statistics released in September showed St. Louis had a murder rate of 66.1 per 100,000 people in 2017, the worst rate in the nation. Hayden said about half the shootings – fatal and non-fatal – in St. Louis are drug-related and another 35 percent “are based on personal vendettas and disputes.”

The city has seen 80 confirmed homicides so far this year, up slightly from the same time a year ago. Only 23 of the crimes have been solved, in part due to lack of cooperation from victims. All but eight of the 80 victims were black in a city that is nearly equally split between blacks and whites.