Police Search for Gunmen Who Shot 6 Children, 1 Woman at Philadelphia Schoolyard

Surveillance photos released by Philadelphia police of a shooting outside an elementary school on the evening of Feb. 23, 2023. (Courtesy of Philadelphia Police Department)

Police in Philadelphia are searching for three gunmen who opened fire on seven people, including six children, in a schoolyard on Thursday.

The Philadelphia Police Department said in an emailed statement to The Epoch Times that the shooting happened just before 6 p.m. near the intersection of 31st and Norris streets, in close proximity to the James G. Blaine School.

Three gunmen pulled up at the intersection in a gray, four-door Hyundai Elantra—estimated to be a model year 2011 to 2016—with a Pennsylvania license plate, and opened fire on a 2-year-old girl, her 31-year-old mother, two 16-year-old boys, a 15-year-old boy, a 13-year-old boy, and a 17-year-old boy, police said.

According to police, the 2-year-old girl was shot once in the left thigh and her mother was shot twice in the left thigh. One of the 16-year-old boys was shot once in the left arm and the other was shot in the right arm and left thigh. The 15-year-old boy sustained two gunshot wounds to his chest and right thigh body while the 13-year-old boy was shot in the left hand, and the 17-year-old boy was grazed in the left thigh.

All seven victims were taken to the hospital and are in stable condition, according to police.

No one has been arrested as of yet and police are still investigating the shooting. It is not immediately clear what led to the shooting or if the gunmen knew the victims.

They are searching for three black men in connection with the incident.

All three of the shooters were captured on security cameras wearing black clothing, police said. One suspect was wearing a black New Balance brand sweater and black face mask at the time of the shooting. Another was wearing a black hooded sweatshirt with dark pants, and black Under Armour brand sneakers while the third was also dressed in a black hooded sweatshirt

‘Unrelenting Scourge of Gun Violence’

“This has been a fairly quiet portion of the 22nd District for quite some time now,” Philadelphia Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw said at a press conference after the shooting on Thursday. “At this point, we’re piecing everything together to figure out if this is retaliatory, if some of those victims were intended or not, but it’s still really early to tell or figure out why this happened when it did today.”

In a separate statement, Philadelphia Federation of Teachers President Jerry Jordan said he was “enraged” that the “unrelenting scourge of gun violence is our ever-persistent reality.”

“Our schools must be safe. Our schoolyards must be safe. Our children’s walks to and from school must be safe. Our communities must be safe. While we must do everything in our collective power to ensure that our schools and communities at large are safe, we cannot do this without real, systemic change to our commonwealth’s gun laws,” Jordan said.

To date, there have been 64 homicides in Philadelphia this year according to the Office of the City Controller, marking a 16 percent decrease from 2022.

Mayor Jim Kenney called the shooting “heartbreaking.”

“Schools and other public spaces must remain safe havens for youth and the community. It’s heartbreaking and infuriating to learn of another shooting occurring on or near school grounds. I’m praying for the victims involved,” Kenney wrote on Twitter.

Thursday’s shooting occurred just two blocks away from where Temple University Police Officer Christopher Fitzgerald was fatally shot on Feb. 18.