ST. LOUIS – “Have we gotten so low that we’re shooting our own children?” Reverend Earl Nance, Jr. said.
That’s the question the reverend wants answered after a 9-year-old is shot in North City.
“It’s alarming because it used to be we protected our young people from situations like that,” he said.
“The last thing we want to do is see a child hurt like that but it’s happening too many times!”
The reverend points to this latest shooting on North Grand and Montgomery Street as another clear reminder that there needs to be action.
St. Louis Police say the 9-year-old child was shot in the buttocks shortly before 3 o’clock in the afternoon on Sunday.
We’re told when police arrived they found the child conscious and breathing.
Witnesses on scene say they were stunned.
“Anybody else could’ve got hit, but a nine-year-old boy that’s devastating,” a witness said.
EMS took the child to Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital where family members say doctors removed the bullet and the child is expected to make a full recovery.
Ironically in the same place the shooting happened, Reverend Nance and other pastors and community leaders had already plan to hold a march to address what they’re calling an open-air drug market.
They’re demanding a new beginning on a street many people drive by every day.
“The more I hear about these things the more upset I become and the more determined I am to help make a difference along with others,” the reverend said.
“We’re in crisis mode right now and we need to stop attacking each other and we need to start attacking the crisis,” Vice-President of Better Family Life James Clark said. “We got to put all of our differences aside. We’ve got to stop competing, we’ve got to come to the bottom and resource efforts at the bottom and we’ve got to do what’s necessary irregardless of who gets the credit.”