Two people were shot on Detroit's east side early Thursday morning, and one suspect is in custody after a brief standoff with police — another violent episode in a city where residents pay the price for failed leadership.
Detroit police responded to a 911 call around 4:40 a.m. and found two gunshot victims in a parked vehicle on Golbourn Avenue, near 7 Mile and Van Dyke, according to WDIV. Both were transported to a local hospital and listed in stable condition. A third occupant suffered a laceration but declined medical attention. Police say the shooting actually occurred a few blocks away on Yolanda Street before the victims' vehicle ended up on Golbourn.
A suspect was taken into custody after the standoff. No name or charges have been released.
The east side of Detroit has been ground zero for the city's crime crisis for years, and ordinary residents — the ones who go to work, raise families, and obey the law — are the ones who absorb the consequences when prosecutors decline to charge, judges release, and politicians look the other way.
And Detroit isn't alone. The overnight tally across the country reads like a casualty report from a war nobody in power wants to acknowledge.
In Hyattsville, Maryland, a man was found shot to death in the road around 5:15 a.m. Thursday, WJLA reported. Prince George's County police have no suspect and no motive.
In Cincinnati, a shooting in Walnut Hills left one person dead Wednesday night. Cincinnati police called it an "isolated incident" — a phrase that offers cold comfort to the dead and their families. No arrests had been made and no suspect details were released, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer.
In Lorain County, Ohio, an Oberlin College professor and an unidentified woman were found shot to death in a home Wednesday morning. Police took Daniel Jones, 31, into custody; charges are pending. WOIO reported that Pipo Nguyen-Duy, a professor of studio art and photography, was found dead on the first floor with a gunshot wound, and the woman was found on the second floor. Officers discovered the bodies after responding to a smoking vehicle registered to Jones on the Oberlin College campus.
Even city infrastructure is deadly. In Rochester, New York, a man in a motorized wheelchair was crushed and killed by a city-owned garbage truck making a left turn Tuesday afternoon, according to WHAM. Witnesses said the wheelchair was pinned under the front end of the truck. The driver, a man in his 50s, was not injured. Police said they don't believe drugs or alcohol were involved. Rochester Mayor Malik Evans offered condolences and promised a thorough investigation — the same script every city official reads after the fact.
Detroit police are asking anyone with information about the east side shooting to contact the 11th Precinct Detective Unit at 313-596-1100 or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-SPEAKUP.
The question that matters: how many more shootings before the people who run these cities stop offering condolences and start doing their jobs?
