PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Advocates for shooting and homicide victims in Philadelphia are pulling their resources to help the overwhelming number of victims in one section of the city, after another weekend of gun violence which centered in that area.
Two people were killed and four others, including a pregnant woman, were wounded in separate shootings in Philadelphia over the weekend. Most of the gun violence happened in West and Southwest Philadelphia.
Officials are hoping a new community-based anti-violence initiative in those areas can help make a difference.
Philadelphia’s Anti-Violence Partnership, the District Attorney’s CARES program, Penn‘s Injury Science Center and the Beloved Care project will now streamline their services to those who have been affected by the gum violence crisis, in an effort to potentially slow the bullets.
"A multicultural, multigenerational, multi-organizational coordination of expertise, skills, and services from the public, academic, nonprofit, and grassroots levels," said Natasha Danielá de Lima McGlynn, executive director with the Anti-Violence Partnership of Philadelphia.
"To collectively address the scale and complexity of gun violence in West and Southwest; two geographic areas in Philadelphia that have the highest concentrated violence."
She said the partners' effort is called the West/Southwest Collaborative and will mainly focus on "hot spot" areas of violence.
Those West and Southwest neighborhoods have seen some of the largest increases in incidents of gun violence since the pandemic began.
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That trend continued over the weekend with a double shooting at Lindbergh Boulevard and Island Ave. Police say around 8:30 p.m., people in a white car were shooting at two people in another car, which then crashed in a Wendy’s parking lot while trying to get away.
Police say a 25-year-old man then tried to run away, but he was shot more and was killed. A 24-year-old pregnant woman who was with him was shot in the back. Police say she survived and so did the unborn baby.
A few hours prior, police say, there was a shooting at 56th and Walnut streets. Didarul Maksud works at a gas station there and spoke to NBC 10.
"I move my head to pump No. 7, and I saw one guy was standing with a gun and pointing in this direction, shooting," he said.
The two victims in that case, both men, are in critical condition.
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Earlier Sunday morning, police say, a man was killed on Pallas Street near Belmont Avenue. On Saturday, police say, a 22-year-old man was shot on Essington Avenue and is in critical condition.
These incidents happened ahead of District Attorney Larry Krasner’s planned announcement on Monday of a collaborative response to the gun violence in Southwest and West Philly.
Overall, as of Monday morning, there have been 450 homicides in Philadelphia this year, according to Philadelphia Police Department data. That is a 14% increase over the number of homicides at the same time last year.
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