BRUNSWICK, Ga. (AP) — A young boy opened fire on a woman pushing her baby in a stroller in a Georgia neighborhood, killing the 1-year-old boy and wounding the mother, police said.
The woman, Sherry West, told WAWS-TV that two boys approached her and demanded money Thursday morning. Brunswick Police Chief Tobe Green said the boys are thought to be between 10 and 15 years old.
West said she insisted she didn’t have any money and tried to protect her son, Antonio, before shots rang out. She had been walking near her home in this coastal city about 80 miles south of Savannah.
“I put my arms over my baby and he shoves me, and then he shot my baby right in the head,” West said.
West was shot in the leg.
“This is obviously a terrible day in Brunswick,” Brunswick Mayor Bryan Thompson said. “Please call if you know something. You are complicit in this crime.”
The boy’s father, Louis Santiago, told the TV station he wishes he could have been there to protect his family.
“He was special,” Santiago said. “He had the bluest, bluest eyes.”
Officers from a SWAT team checked vacant houses as investigators tried to find possible witnesses. The Georgia Department of Natural Resources provided a helicopter to aid the search.
Police are offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction.
A sketch artist from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation was being sent to Brunswick to assist police with the case. Police in Brunswick are leading the investigation, but the GBI provided assistance by helping with the neighborhood search, GBI Special Agent Mike McDaniel said.
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.