She was in her second week at day care and seated in a red buggy while out on a morning walk with classmates. Without warning, police said, occupants of a vehicle stepped out late Thursday morning and sprayed 22nd Street in Southeast Washington with gunfire.
Two men were killed and a third was injured. A D.C. Council member said teachers used their bodies to shield the children from harm. Two bullets got through, striking 2-year-old Emily in the arm and stomach, according to her family.
“The little girl wasn’t even crying when she was hit,” council member Trayon White Sr. (D-Ward 8) said in a post on Instagram. Emily’s grandmother said she was wearing a shirt given to her by the mother of her former playmate Ty’ah Settles, a 3-year-old killed by a stray bullet in May, less than a mile away.
U.S. Park Police flew the child in a helicopter to Children’s National Hospital as a D.C. fire paramedic gave her a whole blood transfusion. Police said they believed the girl would survive, but her family said she was in intensive care on Friday and was in a crucial 72-hour observation period to learn the extent of her injuries. The Washington Post is identifying her by only her first name because her family is concerned about their safety.
The shooting on 22nd Street between Savannah Street and Alabama Avenue put the number of killings in D.C. over the 100 mark for the year. It also served as a reminder that violent crime is a top concern in the nation’s capital, even as it drops from quarter-century highs last year. Residents expressed anger over the shooting. Emily’s grandmother said she was “numb” and that police need to do more. An advisory neighborhood commissioner called for the police chief’s resignation.
D.C. police identified the two men who died as Lamont Street, 29, of Capitol Heights, Md., and Jermaine Proctor, 50, of Southeast Washington. Police announced no leads and had made no arrests as of Friday afternoon.
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White, who represents the ward where Emily was shot, said in his Instagram post that his “spirit is drained.” He said people “pulled out several guns and started shooting when a group of kids were out there. Kids, man. Some of them babies.” White said he prays for “swift justice for the individuals responsible for this.” He did not immediately respond to an interview request Friday.
The lawmaker said “it has become acceptable that people who live amongst us” and shoot guns “walk around freely with no consequences. It happens again and again and again.”
White said he has talked with staff at the day care, Cre8tive Korner Early Learning, who told them how they shielded the children and rushed them back inside the center, only then discovering that one of them had been shot. The red buggy Emily was in holds three children; it was unclear whether other children were riding with her.
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The blocks surrounding the shooting were relatively quiet Friday morning. A parked police car’s lights flashed in the parking lot next to Cre8tive Korner, which was shuttered for the day; thick blinds were pulled down over its windows. Several residents and workers at businesses on the block declined to discuss the attack; one reported hearing the gunshots but said they were too scared to be interviewed.
“It’s a sad thing to have to keep going through,” said Ashley Washington, 30, who lives nearby. “It’s sad that the kids have got to see this stuff. They shouldn’t have to come out the corner store getting their candy and chips worried about a bullet going through them.”
Joseph Johnson, who chairs the Advisory Neighborhood Commission for the area where Ty’ah Settles was killed, told reporters that D.C. Police Chief Pamela A. Smith should resign following the shootings of the two toddlers this year. Smith, who has been at the helm for about a year and a half, has no plans to leave, a department spokesman said.
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Smith went to the scene Thursday to brief the press on the incident and to denounce the attack. “We are working hard every single day to ensure that this kind of violence is decreased in our communities,” she said.
Emily’s grandmother, Priscilla Johns, 46, said Emily underwent surgery and blood transfusions, and doctors remain hopeful for a full recovery. She said the family wants residents to see Emily’s picture and remember her name, in hopes that something is done to curtail gun violence.
“Enough is enough,” Johns said, adding that city leaders must “do better.”
The grandmother said her daughter, who was at her daughter’s hospital bedside and did not want to be interviewed, had waited until Emily began to talk before putting her in the day-care center. Emily’s mother works with people with developmental disabilities.
Johns asked for prayers and said that Emily’s mother and father were the only relatives allowed to visit on Thursday, and that she was hopeful she would soon be able to join them. She said Emily’s parents spent the night at the hospital.
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Johns said her daughter told her she regretted putting Emily in the day-care center. “I told her, ‘Don’t blame yourself.’” She said her daughter replied: “I should have kept her home. I should have kept her home.”
Emily’s family and Ty’ah Settles’s family are close, according to Johns, and the two girls played often. Johns said she is the godmother to Ty’ah’s mother, and the family considered the two girls to be cousins. Johns said Ty’ah attended the same day-care center as Emily. Police have not made an arrest in Ty’ah’s killing.
Johns described Emily as a playful character, “so loving and amazing.” In photos shared by the family, Emily is lovingly dressed in coordinated outfits, her hair in braids and beads. She is often smiling: eating vanilla ice cream from a wafer cone, giving a thumbs up, standing on a park bench. In one, she strikes a more serious pose while clutching a book.
Johns said Emily is her daughter’s first child, and her first grandchild. Emily loves to look at books, her grandmother said, and knows the date she was born and how to spell her name.
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