25 shot, 4 killed in violent Father's Day weekend in Detroit, Chief Craig says violent crime up 7%

DETROIT (FOX 2) - Detroit Police Chief James Craig said Monday that overall crime is down 9% despite violent crime going up 7 percent through Monday, June 22.

Chief Craig gave updates on several shootings in Detroit over the Father's Day weekend, including the shooting of two children on Plainview Street.

The chief announced a 1 p.m. press conference for Monday at Detroit Public Safety Headquarters in Downtown Detroit to discuss the weekend of violence. He announced there were 18 different shooting scenes in the city of Detroit which landed 25 people in the hospital and ended in four deaths.

Of the shootings, Craig said there were 5 double shooting scenes, a triple shooting on Plainview that involved two children where a 37-year-old man, a 10-year-old girl, and a 9-year-old were shot Sunday night. Police said the shooter targeted the three of them. The 10-year-old girl is improving while the 9-year-old has been released from the hospital.

Craig also said there was a 'mass shooting' at a home near Puritan and Appoline when someone pulled up and shot two women and two men. Craig said a fifth person had been shot but did not elaborate. He said nobody was killed in the shootings.

According to the chief, overall violent crime is up 7.5 percent in total. However, he said, property crime is down roughly 16%, meaning overall, crime is down 9%. 

"Factually, we look at what happened here last weekend, our crime is up. But also overall crime is down," Craig said.

He said the lower crime rate is due, in part, to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's Stay Home order which was in place for part of March and all of April and May. 

Of the weekend shootings, Craig said four of them were at block or house parties and one was in a dispute over a parking space where an argument escalated to gunshots.

The first shooting reported of the weekend was at 2:30 a.m. on Saturday when a man in his 20s was found shot to death inside an SUV on Mark Twain between Fenkell and Lyndon on the city's west side. No suspect information was available.

On Saturday around 6 a.m., police said a 35-year-old man was found shot to death inside a home on Cameron just east of I-75 in Detroit. Police did not provide more information about the victim or any potential suspects.

Police have asked anyone with information in any of these shootings to contact CrimeStoppers at 1-800-SPEAK-UP.