A baby girl was killed in Ohio when a drive-by gunman shot up her dad’s car, according to police.
Desire Hughes, who was just 7 months old, was in the back seat of her dad’s car waiting at a red light late Wednesday when someone leaned out of a passing car and fired a volley of shots, Toledo police said.
Dad Jeremiah Hughes — who was also grazed by one of the bullets — sped off to a hospital, where his daughter was pronounced dead, he told The Toledo Blade after being treated for his own wounds.
The autopsy showed the baby had been hit in the chest, the paper noted.
“My baby … they really took that girl from me,” 20-year-old Hughes told the paper.
“I was a happy dad, you feelin’ me? She was gonna change my life, man,” he said. “That was the one that was gonna change my life. That’s why I’m so sick, I don’t even know what to do.”
Hughes told the paper that he had no idea why his car was shot up, and that he was helping police ID the shooter.
Toledo Mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz said that his chats with the police chief and gang taskforce officials made it clear it was just the latest “heartbreaking” result of drug- or gang-related violence.
“No one pulls up to a car and shoots into another car randomly,” he told The Blade.
“It’s unfair to the 275,000 who live in the city to feel less safe than they should have because of the 50 people in a gang who are playing out a revenge drama that affects all of us.”
He said that in each similar case, “the victim has known his or her attacker.”
“It doesn’t make it any less heartbreaking but it does affect how we address the problem,” he said.