WASHINGTON — Communities in the D.C.-metro area are in mourning and shock after two toddlers were shot within one week.
15-month-old Carmelo Duncan died Wednesday in Southeast D.C. He and his father were driving along Southern Avenue when bullets struck the little boy as he sat in the back seat, according to the Metropolitan Police Department.
Less than 40 miles and a state line away, a 2-year-old boy was shot in the foot Saturday night inside a Montgomery Village, Maryland home, according to a release from Montgomery County Police.
“Last night it was a really tragic. A 2-year-old baby was shot. It’s something you don’t really hear about. Which is sad, It needs to stop. It really does,” said Darren Upson, a neighbor in the 2-year-old's community.
According to Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit that tracks American gun violence, more children under the age of 12 have been killed or injured by guns in the United States so far this year than in the last seven years the organization has been tracking the shooting statistic.
According to the nonprofit, 919 children under the age of 12 have been killed or injured by gun violence in America so far this year. In 2019 the agency reported 692 children were killed or injured by gun violence.
In the seven-years that the organization has been tracking gun violence, five children under the age of 12 were killed by guns in D.C.
Makiyah Wilson was one of those victims. She was a vibrant and outgoing little girl who her parents said loved school. She was killed in 2018 on her way to get ice cream.
In Maryland, 20 children have been killed by gun violence in the last seven years, according to the Gun Violence Archive.
In Virginia, the numbers are bleaker, and Gun Violence Archive stats show that since 2014, 49 children lost their lives before the age of 12 to gun violence.
In an interview with WUSA9’S Eric Flack last month Rob Wilcox, the Deputy Director of Policy and Strategy at Everytown for Gun Safety, said the pandemic exacerbated gun violence on the streets and has created a perfect storm of gun shootings in the home as well.
"The root causes of gun violence are simple food insecurity, housing insecurity, lack of support systems, and Coronavirus has exacerbated so many of those, you mix that with easy access to firearms and what you have is a powder keg,” Wilcox said.
In Montgomery County, police said they’re investigating the circumstances of how that 2-year-old little boy was shot.
Police said the child did not live at the Brassie Place address and they are still determining if the shooting was an accident or a criminal act.