WASHINGTON
--
Minutes after city leaders held a press conference Saturday addressing a 24-hour spike in violent crime, a 16-year-old boy was shot in the stomach at the Fort Chaplin Park apartments in Northeast Washington.
That wounding marked the ninth shooting in D.C. since late Friday -- a wave of crime that left four people dead and seven injured.
Police said the wounded teen collapsed near the 6th District police station. Detectives questioned several people and made two arrests on drug and gun charges.
On Saturday evening, Mayor Adrian Fenty called the crime spree "beyond intolerable."
"We are frustrated, but we're redoubling our efforts to make sure we not only catch people who do this, and prevent further shootings, but bring tranquility to these neighborhoods," Fenty said.
The mayor said he is particularly concerned about crime in the city's 5th District, where as of Friday night, seven people have been killed in two weeks.
He said police have a strategy to address the spike in crime before the summer. He said 1,200 officers are flooding the affected neighborhoods, particularly in the 5th District. That is three times the normal number of officers on patrol in the city.
The series of shootings began just before midnight Friday in the 100 block of Galveston Place, Southwest. The victim was shot in the back but is expected to survive, police said.
Around 12:30 a.m. Saturday, police were called to the 2700 block of Langston Place in Southeast, where two people had been shot. Their wounds are said to be non-life threatening.
Then at about 12:45 a.m., a man was critically injured in a shooting at 8th and Yuma streets Southeast, police said. He was driven to Greater Southeast Hospital, then transferred to Washington Hospital Center, where he died. Police identified the victim as 31-year-old Kenneth Walley, of the 3900 block of 8th Street in Southeast.
Not far from that location a person was found shot to death around 1 a.m. in the 3000 block of Stanton Road Southeast. Detectives identified the victim as 28-year-old Billy Evans Middleton, who lived in the same block where he was killed.
Police were also called to the 1200 block of Morse Street Northeast about 2:20 a.m. for a shooting, where they found a person dead.
The homicide happened in the 5th District, where police have been providing extra patrols after six people were killed in the area in less than two weeks.
Police were also called to two other shooting scenes early Saturday, one on Eldens Street Southeast and the other on Monticello Avenue Northeast. A total of three people were injured in the two incidents. One man died in the Eldens Street shooting -- 20-year-old Eric Woods of Capital Heights, Md.
The last shooting happened about 4:40 a.m. on 49th Street Southeast. Police arrived to find a man suffering gunshot wounds. He was taken to a nearby hospital with serious injuries.
The rash of shootings has police struggling to keep up. On Saturday morning, a task force of community leaders met to discuss ways to curb the violence.
David Bowers, founder of a group called No More Murders D.C., is part of that task force.
"It's going to take more than hard working police and social service," he said. "It'll take all facets of our community."
Police said they are doing the best they can, but they need the public's help.
"We're out here, we're doing the best job that we can" police Lt. Judith Anderson said. "We can't do that without information from
partners in the community to help solve these."
D.C. police offer rewards up to $25,000 for information that leads to arrest and conviction in any homicide case. Anyone with information about the shootings is asked to call police at 202-727-9099 or 1-888-919-2746.
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