3 women shot over Instagram post part of disturbing gun violence trend in Philadelphia
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Philadelphia is seeing a disturbing trend of women and girls injured or killed in shootings. Police say three women were shot last weekend over an Instagram post.
Police are in the early stages of their investigation but say they need help to identify multiple shooters who together fired more than 30 times.
"We heard like bang, bang, bang, bang," Brewerytown resident Jilian Leonard said.
A blown-out car window was left behind in Brewerytown after police say three women were shot early Sunday morning, alarming neighbors.
"We were both sleeping. We jolted up, looked outside and cops were here right away basically," Leonard said.
Officers say before the shooting, the victims were at a home for an Airbnb party.
"We don't believe it was a sanctioned rented property at this point," Philadelphia Police Capt. John Walker said.
Walker says one of the women had made a post on social media before the three left. Then as they returned to the Airbnb, all still riding in an SUV, multiple shooters approached and fired more than 30 times.
"We have three young ladies sitting in the hospital right now shot in a situation like this. We're not gonna release that at this point. We know it's an Instagram post that we believe triggered it," Walker said when asked what the post said.
The victims are 19, 20 and 21 years old. They are listed in stable condition.
CBS3 found they're also now a part of a troubling trend.
A growing number of women and girls have been shot in Philly. Year to date, more than 180 women and girls have been shot in the city. That's more than twice as many during the same time in 2018 and 2019.
What's leading to this big increase?
"We don't know. We know Saturday night we had a lot of female shooting victims," Walker said. "We're working to figure it out with our investigative team along with our research teams that we have with the health department and the Office of Violence Prevention."
No guns were recovered and no arrests were made.
