WASHINGTON D.C.— On Friday, August 21, a five-year-old boy was shot in the 1300 block of Congress Street Southeast, Washington D.C. at 4:24 p.m.

The incident occurred in the vicinity of an attempted robbery of pedestrians who fled. In response, one of the alleged robbers fired many shots, accidentally hitting the young boy rather than the intended target. The bullet struck the boy in the stomach while he happened to be walking to the local grocery store with his mother. Emergency Medical Services took him to to the local hospital where he was treated for non-life threatening injuries and is in stable condition.

D.C. Police Chief Peter Newsham said that the incident was a street robbery gone wrong. According to Kyley Schultz of WUSA, he called the crime “brazen” and said, “We gotta do something about these guys who feel it’s ok to indiscriminately fire guns in our community. A mother and her 5-year-old son ought to be able to walk to the grocery store without having to take her son to the hospital for a gunshot wound. I think we all agree on that.”

Authorities are currently looking for two suspects who appear to be in their late teens or early 20s. On Saturday, August 22, the department released pictures of the two suspects and are offering a reward to anyone with information about them.

Denise Smith, a resident in this neighborhood for four decades, told WUSA, “It’s a shame you can’t even walk down the street, you can’t even stand in front of your house without getting shot.”

“What else can I do? Am I supposed to just stay in the house and not go anywhere?”