Armed to the Teeth, They Wreak Havoc
By David Gambacorta & Dana Difilippo, Philadelphia Daily News
Mar. 31–A group of thugs packed into a minivan and armed with high-powered weapons opened fire at a man outside of a Frankford bar early yesterday morning and hit two of his kids and two other adults instead, police said.
The bloody attack started at 1:15 a.m., when police said three men in a Chrysler minivan looking to settle an argument drove past Primos Sports Bar and Grill on Arrott Street near Griscom, and one of them shouted, “There he is!”
The silver minivan backed up, and the suspects – armed with an assault rifle, a shotgun and a handgun – started blasting away, said Chief Inspector Joseph Fox. Police were still counting all of the shell casings yesterday.
The barrage of bullets missed the intended target, who was standing outside of Primos, but found two of his sons, who were sitting in their mother’s car. A 7-year-old boy was shot once in the face, and a 10-year-old boy was hit once in the back, Fox said.
The boys were taken to St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children. The 7-year-old was in critical but stable condition after surgery yesterday morning, Fox said, and the 10-year-old was listed in stable condition after a bullet was pulled from his back. Fox declined to identify the young victims.
A 5-month-old boy in the car suffered glass cuts, but his 7-year-old sister was unharmed, Fox said. The mother of the children apparently picked up the kids at their grandmother’s shortly before she arrived at the bar. She was also was unharmed.
“There are conflicting stories at this point,” Fox said. “She picked the kids up from her mother’s. Why she showed up at the bar, I don’t know.”
Bullets also tore through Primos, striking and critically wounding a patron, 25, once in the back, and a barmaid, 19, once in the leg. Both were taken to Temple University Hospital, police said. The patron was still listed in critical condition last night, and the barmaid was in stable condition.
Officers from the 15th Police District heard the gunfire and raced to Arrott Street. Their car came face-to-face with the suspects’ minivan, Fox said.
The suspects panicked and backed up into a metal and concrete pole before jumping out of the van. Police apprehended two of the suspects and one managed to escape. An assault rifle was recovered in the van, and the shotgun was found nearby.
Anthony Sharpe, 19, and David Holloway, 22, were each charged with four counts of aggravated and simple assault, reckless endangerment, firearms violations and related offenses. Fox said both had previous run-ins with police, mainly over drugs.
Fox declined to comment on whether the mother and father of the injured kids had records themselves. He added investigators are “talking to a lot of people who all played some part in this” dispute.
Given the weapons the suspects used, Fox noted that he could have imagined “a lot of scenarios that would have been not as good.”
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