Times Square Shooting: 4-Year-Old Child In A Stroller Among 3 Victims Of Gun Violence In New York

Times Square Shooting: According to the New York police commissioner, the three were bystanders who did not seem to know each other. They had been around when an argument between two to four men and at least one of these men fired a gun.

NYP officers patrol after two women and a four-year-old girl were injuring by gun fire in Times Square, New York on May 8, 2021. A shooting in New York's bustling Times Square has injured two women and a four-year-old girl, in an incident US authorities were still scrambling to understand, police said Saturday. (Kena Betancur / AFP)

New York: A four-year-old girl and two women have been injured in the latest incident of Gun violence wherein a shooting took place in Times Square on Saturday.

According to news agency AFP quoting an NYPD spokesperson, it occurred just before 5:00 pm local time (9:00 pm GMT), at the intersection of 7th Avenue and 44th Street.

Three people were injured in the shooting incident at Times Square. The victims include a four-year-old child in a stroller who was hit in the leg when her family was buying toys. The other two were a 46-year-old woman who was hit in the foot, and a 23-year-old tourist from Rhode Island hit in the leg.

New York police commissioner Dermot Shea informed at a press briefing that the victims were hospitalized in Manhattan, and their lives were not in danger.

Shea added that the three were bystanders who did not seem to know each other. They had been around when an argument between two to four men and at least one of these men fired a gun.

Police have issued an appeal for witnesses as arrests had been made by early evening. Surveillance camera footage of the wanted man was also released.

According to a report by the Times Square Alliance (the neighborhood business association) cited by AFP, the area had recorded 25 violent crimes in just the first quarter of this year as compared to 17 in the same period of 2020.

New York was reported to have witnessed increased cases of shootings since the summer of 2020. Crime, in general, went up 30 percent over the same period.