3-year-old one of 6 people shot at same southwest Atlanta apartment complex in recent years

ATLANTA, Ga. — Police are searching for the person who shot a 3-year-old boy in the parking lot of a southwest Atlanta apartment complex.

Witnesses said it was a drive-by shooting and the child was not the target.

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Channel 2′s Tyisha Fernandes was at the Ashley Cascade apartment complex on Kimberly Way on Wednesday, where she spoke to neighbors about a string of recent shootings at the complex.

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Joya Poole said she’s lived at the apartments for about a decade. She said the 3-year-old was shot with a stray bullet while he played outside.

“It could’ve been my grandchildren out here playing,” Poole said. “He could’ve died.”

The child, who hasn’t been identified, is expected to survive.

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Fernandes talked to police, who said that in the last four years, there have been six shootings at the complex. In July 2020, one person died in a triple shooting. The next year, another person was killed. In May 2022, a third person was shot to death. In October 2023, another person was shot and this month, there have been two shootings at the complex.

One neighbor showed Fernandes where a bullet came through her window back in 2022 when someone murdered her neighbor.

“Had my granddaughter been in the bed, they would have shot her in the head,” she said. “The headboard was right here.”

She hopes police find the most recent shooter and she encourages everyone to stop shooting where so many children play.

“It’s been so many shootings, and you, know if something happens, security will come for a moment, then they will dissipate,” she said.

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