Birthday girl killed by stray gunfire

Stray gunfire pierced a window and killed a 10-year-old girl during her birthday party in Chicago, the second time in as many weeks that a child has been shot to death in their South Side neighbourhood.

Siretha White was in her aunt’s ground-floor apartment in Englewood, celebrating her birthday with cousins, when the bullet was fired from a white Cadillac, police said.

She would have turned 11 today.

“The bullet came straight through the window,” said her uncle, Dwight Stevenson.

“It’s a shame that people are shooting at houses. We lost an angel, another angel.”

A witness identified the gunman, leading police to another Englewood house, the Chicago Tribune reported today.

A raid led to the arrests of several men.

Siretha was shot just blocks from the home where 14-year-old honour student Starkesia Reed was killed on March 3 when a stray bullet from an assault rifle went through the window of her family’s house.

Carail Weeks, 24 was charged with first-degree murder in the case.

“This ain’t right,” Siretha’s mother, Siretha Woods, told the Tribune.

“This has got to stop.”