Investigators emerge from a car on Shurtleff Street last Thursday
afternoon after recovering ballistics evidence from the vehicle.
As police tell it, it’s a miracle that no one died last Thursday on Shurtleff Street as two men stopped in the middle of the street and broke up the sunny afternoon by spraying more than a dozen, large .25 calibre bullets throughout the crowded neighborhood.
“We were very, very, very fortunate that no one was hurt, injured or even killed,” said Chief Brian Kyes. “This is no way to start the nice weather and I think we averted a tragedy here.”
According to police, about 2 p.m. last Thursday, a silver Honda Civic stopped in the middle of Shurtleff Street – about one block away from the back of the Bunker Hill Community College campus – and began shooting at one of the buildings.
The shots came from a high-capacity firearm and more than a dozen .25 calibre bullets littered the neighborhood. Police found 12 shell casings at the scene.
Dozens of people on the crowded street scattered as the shots rang out, and the shooters were gone as quickly as they had appeared. Investigators shut down the street for quite some time and recovered three of the bullets. One had broken the window of a minivan, another was downrange in a man’s bedroom and a third was lodged in the baby car seat of an empty, parked four-door sedan.
Kyes said officers were patrolling the neighborhood heavily due to the nice weather and potential for conflict. However, the shooters were able to slip away on foot after a brief chase.
The owner of the vehicle ended up being an older man outside of Chelsea who had let some young people use the vehicle, and he knew nothing of the shootings. The young men were being sought this week.