For those concerned about the news regarding the proliferation of guns (and their use) among all segments of the population, Labor Day Weekend in New York was a virtual exhibition of how many tragedies can occur in the course of just a few short days. Topping the list was a police officer who was on foot patrol with a partner in Bedford-Stuyvesant in the early morning hours on Sunday morning. The two encountered a suspect being chased by three other cops, and the officer was apparently shot by the suspect.in he leg. The cops returned fire, striking the suspect in the back.
Here are some of the other shootings during the long holiday weekend:
- Three people were struck by bullets in an apparent drive-by while the three were waiting for a bus. This also occurred in Bed-Stuy.
- A man in Harlem was shot (the bullet grazed his head) by one of two men who broke into his apartment and stole his PlayStation and his iPhone.
- A 23-year old was shot and killed in the Eastchester section of the Bronx.
- Two teenagers (16 years old) were shot, both in the leg, on Third Avenue in East Harlem.
- A man was shot in Central Park near West 102nd Street.
- In Mott Haven (the Bronx), a man was hit in the face by a bullet, and a teenager was struck in the leg.
These are just a handful of the many instances of gun violence over the weekend. Overall, after just two days, 15 people were shot in New York City. If you thought things couldn’t get much worse, 10 more received gunshot wounds on Labor Day, half having been shot at the West-American Day Festival. Well, actually, the report says that they five were shot in the early morning hours before the official beginning of the festival. The victims included one man who was killed, and several others who were wounded. Police say the injuries and the death were the result of a man opening fire on the crowd that had formed in Crown Heights just prior to the official launch of the festivities.
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