BALTIMORE (WBFF) — Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott called his top public safety leaders to City Hall on Tuesday as the city grapples with a recent surge in gun violence, including five mass shootings in the past five weeks.
The Mayor’s Office confirmed Scott summoned his public safety leadership team for a closed-door meeting focused on the rash of shootings and concerns that the latest violence could slow Baltimore’s historic, years-long reductions in gun violence. Police Commissioner Richard Worley and Stefanie Mavronis, director of the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement, met with the mayor.
The meeting came as community leaders voiced frustration and renewed calls for accountability after repeated shootings across the city, some involving juveniles as perpetrators or victims.
Matthew Johnson-Bey of the Evergreen Neighborhood Protective Association has spoken out about Sunday night’s mass shooting at the BP gas station on Edmondson Avenue near Franklintown Road, where two people were left dead and three others injured.
ALSO READ | Mayor, BPD leaders meet over recent violence including five mass shootings
“It comes from lack of accountability,” Johnson-Bey said.
He added, “You can’t hold the mayor and the police commissioner accountable for an individual crime that another individual did. But what they can be held accountable for is being elected into a position and not making sure that the proper structure is here for these kids.”
The Mayor’s Office, responding to questions Tuesday about what action the city is taking, said “the Baltimore Police Department is directing additional resources toward identifying and apprehending those responsible, preventing further violence, gathering actionable intelligence, and recovering illegal firearms.”
ALSO READ | Four Baltimore mass shootings in one month leave 21 shot and five dead, including children
Sgt. Betsy Smith with the National Police Association called the recent violence a crisis.
“Five mass shootings in five weeks is a crisis for any city, any county,” Smith said.
Smith said police leaders may be holding back details as investigations continue. “The (police commissioner) and his department probably know more than they are talking to the media about, which is appropriate because these types of cases, uh, you have to have your boots-on-the-ground investigators. You have to have your intelligence personnel,” she said.
So far, police have made an arrest in one case out of the five recent mass shootings and two recent triple shootings.
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This post was originally published on Fox 45 by Sinclair Media Group.
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