At least two masked assailants gunned down six young men in East Baltimore Tuesday evening, killing one before driving away in a gray Nissan Ultima.
As shrieks of stunned relatives filled the air, residents described utter chaos as six young men lay wounded on the darkened sidewalk on the 2000 block of Boone Street.
“Everybody was screaming, everyone was running,” said Kennard Watkins, who lives across the street from where the shootings occurred. “I just ran out of my house and couldn’t believe it.”
Witnesses said two men, possibly wearing black hoodies or ski masks came through a back alley and started shooting at the men, who were gathered on a stoop. One victim tried to escape, witnesses said, but the gunman chased him back onto the sidewalk.
“One of them tried to run down the block but he got caught; they all ended up in the same place,” Watkins said.
The Baltimore Police Department identified the slain man as Robert Wilson, 23, who lived on the same block. Donnie Moses, a police spokesman, said Wilson died at Johns Hopkins Hospital around 10 p.m. Tuesday. The other victims were being treated for unknown injuries.
“From what we know all the victims were on the sidewalk when a gray vehicle pulled up with the lights turned out,” Moses said Tuesday night at the crime scene, as mobile flood lights brightened the block, replacing broken street lights. “Right now, as you can imagine, the scene is chaotic.”
Investigators do not know how many shots were fired or what prompted the shooting.
“I was coming out the house,” said a resident who lives nearby but did not wish to be identified. “I heard bang, bang, bang, and there was a car down at the school yard. Two guys got in and drove away.”
“They had on black hoodies,” she added. “Then they sped away with the lights out. I went back into the house because I was scared.”
