There is anger and outrage on the streets of Brooklyn today after a 1-year-old baby was shot in the head Sunday, as his parents pushed his stroller across a Brooklyn street.
The little boy, Antiq Hennis, was killed while sitting in his stroller, as he and his parents were on their way to his grandmother’s house in Brownsville at about 7:20 p.m. As the family was crossing Livonia Avenue, according to police, he was hit on the left side of his face by gunfire and eventually died at the hospital.
While Mayor Michael Bloomberg called the baby’s death a tragedy for the entire city, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said the baby was hit by one of the four shots that were fired, with the bullet going through his head. Police found two bullets in the stroller and recovered four shell casings.
Police investigators believe the boy’s father, Anthony Hennis, who has a long rap sheet of drugs and weapons charges, was the intended target after a dispute he had with the shooter’s brother. But Kelly said the father, who wasn’t hit in the gunfire, has not cooperated with police.
Kelly said police have solid leads and are canvassing surveillance video and a nearby playground in the search for evidence.
The boy’s great-grandmother, Lenore Steele, called him “the sweetest baby.”
“He was such a beautiful little baby, smiling and talking to everybody,” she told NBC New York.
Steele said her grandson, the baby’s father, fell on the stroller when the gunfire sounded and said, “Grandma, my baby got shot! My baby got shot, Grandma!”
The mayor used the shooting to highlight the need for more gun control.
“When background checks aren’t conducted on gun sales, weapons flow to the illegal market and into the hands of people like last night’s shooters,” he said. “It happens over and over again.”
The baby’s mother appeared with community leaders and family members yesterday to ask the suspect – or anyone who knows him – to come forward.
“I’m asking the people in the community to turn that young man in,” said John Rodriguez, president of the 75th precinct’s community council. “That young man shot that 1-year-old. Turn him in, or turn yourself in, because you’re a coward. We don’t shoot babies in our community.”
Murders in the city are down roughly 26 percent compared to the same time last year, according to the mayor’s office. Even in Brownsville, still considered a dangerous neighborhood, the seven murders this year so far are half of the number over the same period in 2012.
