6 Shot On Baltimore Porch; 1 Dead, 2 Critical

BALTIMORE (WJZ)--A brazen act of violence in the middle of the day leaves one person dead and five others injured after a gunman opened fire on a group of people sitting on a front porch.

Gigi Barnett explains two of the victims are still in critical condition.

Police say the gunfire was meant for the porch in Southwest Baltimore, but we've learned from neighbors that the man who died was on his way home from work and may have been an innocent bystander.

Without warning, six men, ages 28 to 72, were shot near a porch Thursday afternoon on Denison Street near Edmondson Avenue.

"They were holding their backs, and I believe they were shot in the back," said one witness.

One man—shot several times—died at the scene.

"Before the police had shown up, I seen a black male laying in the alley slumped over with some blood around him," one witness recalled.

"It just makes you mad to see stuff like this, you know," said a  former neighbor. "It's happening every day. I lived in this neighborhood years ago and it was never like this."

"A little scared because this is my neighborhood where I work," said one bystander.

Witnesses tell WJZ off camera that the shooter came running down the alleyway and opened up fire on the porch. The man who died lives on this block and is in his 40s. A neighbor says that he was coming home from work and stopped there to talk to a friend.

"No one should be running around with guns, gunning down six people in the middle of the afternoon here," said Baltimore Police Commissioner Fred Bealefeld.

The police commissioner and mayor say they're frustrated.

"Someone knows why," said Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake. "Someone can help the police officers find the perpetrator."

The house where it happened has been on city police's radar for several years. It's a known drug dealing spot.

"We're not operating in the dark here. Our officers have conducted many enforcement actions there," Bealefeld said.

The commissioner said there have been frequent complaints about drinking and drugs. 

"The crime scene today is fairly consistent with that," Bealefeld said.

The commissioner says the victims or their families need to come forward to talk about what the issue was that someone felt he had to resolve with violence.  It appears they have an idea of who they're looking for, but still need help from the community.

Police say several of the victims have criminal records. Robbery was not a motive in this shooting.