WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. — A Winston-Salem police officer is sharing his thoughts after three teens were charged with killing a 5-year-old boy in a drive-by shooting.
“You make an arrest and you find out this kid is 14-years-old and you think back to what you were doing when you were 14 years old. I wasn’t running around the street with guns,” said Lt. Gregory Dorn, with the Winston-Salem Police Department.
The crime happened Saturday evening in an apartment complex on Cole Ridge Circle.
Oscar Mendez-Rodriguez is 17 years old. Police say Mendez-Rodriguez, a 15-year-old and a 14-year-old fired into several apartments as they rode down the street.
The 5-year-old was in one of those apartments. He later died at a hospital.
Officers are still looking for one more suspect in this crime.
It’s the latest crime involving teens suspects.
In the past four weeks, police have arrested five suspects, 17 years old and younger, in two different homicides.
“It just shows a trend that they are kind of where they are going to be right now and I don’t know how you get to them to change them,” Dorn said.
It is a change that possibly starts at home, but will take an entire community to keep on track.
“Time and time again you see we are asked, ‘What are you guys doing about it?’ Well what is everybody else doing about it? We need help too to solve these issues, you help us solve these issues,” Dorn said.