A teenage girl was killed in a suspected drive-by shooting and a boy of 16 was left fighting for his life in two gangland attacks in London.
The 17-year-old girl, named locally as Tanesha, was standing with a group of friends in Tottenham when witnesses described how a car “rolled by” and a gunman opened fire from a window.
The girl was hit in the chest and collapsed in Chalgrove Road shortly after 9.30pm on Monday night. Paramedics fought to save her in the street but she was pronounced dead at 10.43pm.
In a separate attack outside a leisure centre in Walthamstow half an hour later, the 16-year-old boy was shot and another boy of 15 was stabbed.
The latest attacks come amid mounting alarm at the rate of killings in London. So far this year, there have been 47 murders in the capital, with 15 in February and 22 last month — both totals exceeding the murder rate for the same period in New York. Detectives appealed for witnesses to the attack in Tottenham saying officers were called to the sound of gun shots at 9.35pm.
Fatima O’Dwyer, who knew the victim, heard the shots from her home and came running out. She said: “Everyone was saying she was talking to a couple of guys and a car rolled by and started shooting up everyone. She wasn’t the target, she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. For a girl to be caught in the middle is devastating. The family were screaming when the police broke the news.”
Another witness said he heard three bangs and then saw the girl slumped in the street and people racing to try to save her. He said: “There were three loud bangs, I ran out and there was a girl propped up with blood coming from a wound which looked like it was in her chest. At first she was speaking but then she just slumped down and to me it was obvious she was dead or dying.” Tyesha Mingo, 21, who held the girl as she died, said: “I tried to save her. She was a good girl, no trouble.
“She was in her house before it happened and she had gone out and was just literally chilling with her friends.
“She was with her best friend who came banging on my door screaming that Tanesha has been shot. I put her on her side and rubbed her back. I told her ‘everything is going to be okay, your mum is on her way’. She was sitting up but couldn’t respond.”
Another neighbour said: “I heard the bangs because I sleep in the front room. I thought it was a bomb. It’s not nice — so many drugs, stabbings, no respect for people any more.”
Friends and family gathered on the street of terraced houses today as forensics officers gathered evidence. One family member said: “We are all devastated. She was a lovely girl.”
The 16-year-old boy was rushed to hospital after being found with gunshot wounds outside Walthamstow Leisure Centre in Markhouse Road.
He remained in a critical condition. The 15-year-old was found at the scene with stab injuries. He was said to be serious but stable in hospital yesterday.
Witnesses said they heard two loud gunshots before police arrived and sealed off the car park.
Police said they were not treating the two shootings as linked. The girl’s murder came amid fears of an escalating “postcode war” between gangs in Tottenham and nearby Wood Green.
Last month aspiring rapper Kelvin Odunuyi, 19, was shot dead outside a cinema in Wood Green by a gunman on a moped.
The Walthamstow victims were thought to have been treated at the Royal London hospital major trauma centre in Whitechapel.