BALTIMORE -- A gunman fired into a crowd that had gathered for a Sunday afternoon cookout on a west Baltimore street, killing a man and wounding seven other people, authorities and news reports said.
Police Commissioner Michael Harrison said the gunfire began after 5 p.m. on a block in the city's western district of brick row homes. Harrison said a man approached a crowd and began firing in what he called "a very tragic, very cowardly shooting."
Speaking at the scene, Harrison said the shooting appeared "extremely targeted," but he didn't provide a possible motive.
The shooting came about six weeks after Harrison's swearing-in last month as Baltimore police commissioner, when he promised to make the city safer and lead the department through sweeping changes required by a federal consent decree. It's a daunting task; Baltimore has experienced more than 300 homicides in each of the past two years, and Harrison is the city's 14th police leader since the mid-1990s.
The commissioner said there were two cookouts taking place on opposite sides of the street Sunday, and shell casings were found in two different locations, indicating that there may have been a second gunman or someone firing back at the first shooter, who fled on foot. It was unclear whether the cookouts were related, Harrison said.
One man who was shot collapsed behind a Baptist church nearby and was pronounced dead at the scene. Harrison said initially that six others had been wounded and were taken to hospitals, but he didn't release their names or their conditions. A police statement later said a man was killed, but it didn't give his age. It said five of the survivors were men ranging in ages from 27 to 58, as well as a 30-year-old woman.
A police spokesman later Sunday evening was cited by The Baltimore Sun as saying an eighth victim, a man with a gunshot wound in the leg, went to a hospital. The report did not elaborate.
"It wasn't anything dealing with the church. I want to make that very clear," acting Mayor Jack Young said.
A Section on 04/29/2019