Two men sought in a brazen daylight shooting where a 12-year-old boy was critically injured while walking down the street with his mother were taken into custody outside a downtown Toronto Canadian Tire store on Monday evening, police said.
Interim Toronto Police Chief Jim Ramer said that after a “painstaking, labour intensive investigation,” gun and gang unit officers confronted two men as they exited the Canadian Tire near Bay and Dundas streets on Monday at about 5 p.m.
Both suspects surrendered immediately and officers allegedly located three loaded guns.
The arrests stem from a shooting on Nov. 7 that injured four people and terrified numerous residents of a North York neighbourhood.
Emergency crews were called to an apartment building in the area of Jane Street and Stong Court, just north of Finch Avenue West, around 2:20 p.m. after multiple calls about shots being fired in the area.
Ramer said two vehicles attended the parking lot of the building.
Occupants of one of the cars got out and ran at the occupants of the other, firing multiple rounds at them.
When officers arrived, they located a 12-year-old who was struck by a bullet while he was walking with his mother on the west side of Jane Street, Ramer said.
The boy was rushed to a trauma centre, where he is in critical condition. The mother was not injured.
Ramer said they later located three occupants of the victim vehicle, all teenagers, suffering from gunshot injuries a short distance away at a residence on Driftwood Avenue.
A 17-year-old boy was transported to a hospital with life-threatening injuries, while the two other victims suffered serious but non-life-threatening injuries and are in hospital in stable condition.
Ramer said Tuesday that all three victims have since been discharged from hospital.
The 12-year-old boy remains in life-threatening condition.
“Having something like this happen in the middle of the afternoon when they were in the area to do some shopping – frankly it’s unbelievable,” Ramer said.
Several rounds were found in parked vehicles and lodged in walls of nearby homes.
A father told CP24 his 16-year-old daughter was in their home when a bullet pierced the wall and flew just a few feet past her.
The two men arrested were identified as Rashawn Chambers, 24, of Toronto and Jahwayne Smart, 25, of no fixed address.
They are facing a total of 28 charges, including several counts of attempted murder, aggravated assault, discharging a firearm with intent to wound and weapons offences.
Both men made first appearances in court at 1000 Finch Avenue West on Tuesday morning.
Ramer said both men are also suspected in a Nov. 4 shooting at 390 Driftwood Avenue, approximately 850 metres away from the Nov. 7 scene, in which “multiple” rounds were fired late in the night.
Some bullets from that incident made their way through windows and into a nearby daycare.
