Boy, 7, Still In Critical Condition After Christmas Eve Shooting
GARY, Ind. (CBS) -- A 7-year-old boy remained in critical condition on Monday, after he was shot in the head while inside his home in Gary, Ind., late at night on Christmas Eve.
Meantime, Gary police were still working to figure out who fired multiple shots into the home, striking the boy and a 36-year-old man during a Christmas Eve party.
As CBS 2's Derrick Blakley reports, police and neighbors were both worried and puzzled.
A single bullet hole was the only physical vestige of the hail of gunfire that erupted shortly before midnight on Christmas Eve at 1006 Durbin Av. in Gary, as a party went inside.
The bullet left 7-year-old Leonard Cobb III in critical condition at the University of Chicago's Comer Children's Hospital, after he was shot in the head.
"It sounded like firecrackers, and we were like, 'No, it's not firecrackers,' and my husband was like, 'No, it's not no firecrackers,' so it was like gunshots and it was a lot of them," said a neighbor who asked only to be identified as Lisa.
Lisa said she has lived on that block 40 years. After the shooting, she saw the car of a longtime friend, 36-year-old Kenneth Farr outside the home.
"I called him to see what was going on," Lisa said. "He drove past down the street and he said, 'I been shot, I been shot in the groin area.'"
Police recovered multiple shell casings from the scene. Some neighbors heard up to six shots.
Gary Police Cpl Gabrielle King said, "It's always puzzling when someone would be as cowardly as to stand outside and shoot inside, because you never know who you're going to hit. You don't know where those bullets are gonna go."
That stretch of Durbin Avenue is a desolate block; pockmarked by vacant lots and as many abandoned homes as occupied houses.
Neighbor Cassandra Hatcher said it's normally pretty quiet on that block, but it's "not really surprising for me, because these are things that happen in this city. You know, things happen like this all the time."
Gary police said they aren't surprised, just stumped.
"It's like a puzzle. We're trying to put it together," King said.
Gary police were trying to interview the people who were inside the house during the pary, as well as the mother of the critically injured boy.
Neither Cobb nor Farr actually live at the house. Both were simply there celebrating for a Christmas Eve party.
