Another child has been shot while at home in Miami Gardens, becoming the city's 10th shooting victim in 11 days.
The 11-year-old girl was struck by a bullet Wednesday night, allegedly by a man seen driving up and down Northwest 17th Avenue in a white Dodge Neon before opening fire on her house, NBC6 reports.
"According to our witnesses.. the shooter did get out of the car, pointed to the direction of the residence and fired multiple shots, ultimately striking the 11-year-old," Miami Gardens Police Detective Mike Wright told WSVN.
"It sounded like fireworks," said a small boy who heard the shots. The girl was airlifted to Jackson Memorial Hospital, where she is reportedly in stable condition.
The suburban city in the shadow of Sun Life Stadium is also feeling pain. In the last week and a half in Miami Gardens, 10 people have been shot. A 19-year-old was killed outside his home, two people were shot inside a car at an apartment complex, police shot a man who fired at them as they investigated the shooting death of his stepfather, and four men where hospitalized after gunfire sprayed a porch.
Wednesday night's shooting is frustratingly similar to recent shootings that killed or wounded Miami Gardens children inside their homes, including 12-year-old Tequila Forshee. Forshee was getting her hair braided for the first day of school in her grandmother's living room when she was shot in the head by a bullet believed to have been meant for someone else.
“We’re living war zone,” her father Glenn Forshee told CBSMiami after Wednesday night's shooting. “It’s innocent people. We have bullets flying through the city of Miami Gardens. Bullets don’t have names on them. They don’t have eyes, they don’t have nothing."
Last month, eighth-grader Nevilisha Francis was shot while talking on the phone inside her house.
Police have deployed extra security patrols in response to the violence, "making it very uncomfortable for people to leave their house with guns,” said Miami Gardens Mayor Oliver Gilbert.
Residents "deserve, I deserve, the right, the ability to leave my house and feel safe," he told NBC6. "That’s fundamental to not just the Miami Gardens dream, but the Dade County dream, the Florida dream and the American Dream."