Police respond to the scene where a man was shot on April 1 on Dacia Street in Dorchester. Individuals close to the victim cry at the scene. Credit: Nicholaus Czarnecki/Metro
Gun violence is proving to be a bloodier scourge on Boston so far in 2013 than compared to the same time last year.
The most recent data released by the Boston Police Department shows that as of Aug. 26, fatal shootings numbered at 25 compared to 21 during that period last year.
Shootings in which a person was hit, but not fatally injured, have also risen compared to last year. As of late August, 160 people had been hit by gunfire compared to 143 at the same time last year.
What’s more, those numbers don’t include the recent spate of violence on a bloody Sept. 14 that sent seven people to the hospital with gun shot wounds and left a 25-year-old Boston man dead after a shooting.
Those people were shot in four separate incidents that Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis said did not appear to be related. Some of the incidents were gang related and connected to other previous violent incidents, he said.
Davis said that the uptick occurred after a lull in violent activity and that spikes in violence have a tendency to be grouped into small time frames after quiet periods.
“We certainly increased our presence out there and we’re doing everything we can to make sure the violence subsides.”
By the numbers
160
The number of people hit by gunfire in Boston, from Jan. through Aug. 26, 2013, in Boston
25
The number of fatal shootings during that same period.
Read more about Boston gun violence here: Boston lawmakers, residents work to combat city’s gun epidemic
Gun Week: Following the trail of our bloody streets
Boston, Philadelphia, New York City: Three very different cities with a common problem. Gun violence has destroyed the lives of countless individuals and families on our streets and wrought devastation across vibrant neighborhoods, searing itself into their fabric.
Over the next week, Metro will examine the impact that gun violence has had on those cities as well as our country in the aftermath of the recent massacres at Sandy Hook Elementary, Aurora, Co. and the Washington, D.C. Navy Yard. We will look at what each city and the country is doing to combat the age-old problem as well as change the deadly culture that, on a daily basis, leaves its bloody imprint on our communities. – The Editors
