Celebratory gunfire comes to earth and wounds Florida boy

Tragedy struck a Florida family as they celebrated New Year’s in Hillsborough County. Twelve-year-old Diego Duran suffered a bullet wound in the head in the town of Ruskin, across Tampa Bay from St. Petersburgh. The sheriff’s department told the media that the boy was shot while standing in his front yard on 14th Avenue at approximately 1 a.m. on January 1. He and his mother Sandra were outside of their home when she observed Diego fall to the ground while bleeding profusely from his nose and eyes.

Diego’s father, who bears the same name, also saw his son fall wounded to the ground as “hell breaks loose” and blood pooled on the ground, said the elder Duran.  Unaware that little Diego had been shot, the family drove him immediately to hospital in Sun City. It was there that emergency room physicians determined that Diego had been shot and then transferred him to Tampa General Hospital. There Diego remained in critical condition on January 2 while a bullet remains lodged within his skull. Diego’s father remains hopeful, saying “he ain’t going give up. He’s going to grow up and be a better man than what I am."

Detectives have concluded that no one in the immediate area of the incident had been discharging firearms. It would appear that Diego was injured by gunfire falling from the sky. Other residents of Ruskin may have fired rounds to celebrate the entry of the New Year. Other communities reported such celebratory gunfire as the nation celebrated New Years. In Flint Michigan, police reported at least 100 rounds were fired immediately following the toll of midnight as the New Year began.