Police in New York are searching for a gunman after four people, including two teenagers, were shot in Harlem early in the morning. According to Eyewitness News, all four victims are young, and investigators have launched an active investigation as they work to identify who opened fire and why. Officers are appealing to the public for any information that could help move the case forward.
The shooting happened on West 143rd Street and Lenox Avenue, on the outskirts of a park, during the early morning hours at around 1 a.m. Police described chaotic moments as bullets flew, leaving four people wounded at the scene before officers and medics arrived to help those who had been hit.
The victims ranged in age from their teens to their early twenties. Police said a 16-year-old and a 17-year-old were each shot in the foot, a 20-year-old was shot in the groin, and a 21-year-old was shot in the left foot. The two younger victims are minors, and authorities have not released the identities of any of those who were injured.
All four of the wounded were taken to Harlem Hospital for treatment. In what police described as the good news in an otherwise alarming case, all four victims are in stable condition, meaning that despite the number of people struck, no deaths have been reported so far in connection with the shooting.
Investigators say they are still trying to piece together exactly what led up to the gunfire. According to police, it remains unclear what the motive was, whether the four people who were shot even knew one another, and who the gunman is. Officers are working around the clock to reconstruct the sequence of events on the block.
Police also said it is not yet clear whether some kind of celebration had been taking place that carried on into the early morning hours when the shots rang out. That question is one of several that detectives are trying to answer as they look at what was happening in the area in the moments before the shooting.
So far, no arrests have been made, and the gunman is said to have run from the scene. Police are urging anyone who has information that could assist the investigation to contact them right away, stressing that tips from the community could prove crucial in identifying the person responsible for wounding four people on a Harlem street.