PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A 16-year-old boy was gunned down in front of his twin sister in East Oak Lane on Tuesday night after they arrived home from work, police say. Authorities are trying to identify three people who were involved in the ambush.
After their shift at McDonald's, police say, Ahjaon Jackson and his sister took a Lyft home. They arrived around 11 p.m., and after they got out of the car, police say, three people got up close and fired away.
"We know they fired at least 15 shots from a semi-automatic weapon," Chief Inspector Scott Small said. "It appears he was clearly the intended target. Due to the fact that he was struck so many times by gunfire and the ballistic evidence was just feet, and some were just inches, away from where he had collapsed."
Police said the victim was hit 10 times. He died at the hospital. His sister ran to the house and was not hit.
A McDonald's bag and wrapper were still on the sidewalk on Wednesday morning in front of the victim's house.
Robert Fuller, a pastor, lives on East Fariston Drive, just steps away from where the shooting happened, close to Cheltenham Avenue and Crescentville Road. He has been following news of Philadelphia's gun violence, and now he says it is uncomfortably close.
"We see this tragedy every single day. Every single day. But this was close to home," he said. "It really shook my wife up. She was like, 'Wow, I didn’t believe this actually happened in front of our home, near us, to a family we know.'"
Fuller says he was familiar with the boy.
"Every now and then I would see him coming in, going to work and stuff like that, if I’m outside — especially in the summertime we would interact more because we’re outside more."
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Conrad Lokey, who has lived in the neighborhood for nearly three decades, said he heard the gunshots and was taken aback, hearing the next day that a 16-year-old kid had been killed.
"It really does strike home. It could have been my grandson, because he’s out there, too," Lokey said. "And it wasn’t that late."
Police have made no arrests, and there is no clear motive yet for the shooting. Police spoke to the victim's co-workers, who say they are unaware of anything that might have led to the shooting. A number of neighbors have doorbell cameras, and police will be reviewing video from those cameras in their attempt to identify the shooters.
'No place is safe': Candlelight vigil for teen victim
Neighbors gathered Wednesday night at Jackson's home on East Fariston Drive to express their grief, shock and demand for change.
“We don’t do that around here but clearly, it doesn’t matter where you live in Philadelphia you’re susceptible to that kind of violence," said Ray Jackson, Ahjaon's grandfather.
"It's got to stop.”
“We thought this community, with it being a working class community, With lawyers, and DAs, and judges, and firemen living around here, we thought that it was a safe community," neighborhood youth advocate Keenan Hudson added.
"No place is safe in Philadelphia. No place is safe.”
To date, with more than two months to go until the end of the year, police have reported 37 murders of children under the age of 18 killed by guns.
That’s up from 28 juvenile gun murders in 2020 and 12 in 2019.
"How can a 16-year-old offend somebody so bad that you will murder them cold bloodedly? You know, shooting them in the head 10 times altogether in the back, in the chest?" Hudson added.
"It just doesn't make sense at all."
“We have to figure out what we’re going to do about this ongoing problem. It's becoming an epidemic," said 61st Ward Committee Member Angela M. Smith.
“16, he’s a baby. He’s a baby. But, you know what, on the flip note of that, how do we not know that it wasn’t still babies that did it?“
Cheryl, a neighbor at the vigil for Ahjaon, said she personally knows what it’s like to lose a child that you love.
“To lose my nephews and then my girlfriend to lose their sons, it’s just the same thing, a cycle, over and over and over and over again, and it’s so painful because you just relive it.“
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