Anti-violence rally held after 6-year-boy injured in Germantown shooting
GERMANTOWN (WPVI) -- Choking back tears, Laprea Brown spoke for the first time Wednesday night on the very block where her 6-year-old son's body was riddled with nearly a dozen bullets in Philadelphia's Germantown section.
Little Mahaj Brown had just left his grandmother's house last Thursday when he was caught in the crossfire.
"I'm just so blessed and so happy God spared my baby. He's slowly progressing, he's talking now, he's now off his breathing treatment," said Laprea Brown, victim's mother.
Mahaj, called Haji by his family, has had seven surgeries and will likely have more. His mother says he knows what happened to him, but doesn't understand why.
"He told the officer that took him to the emergency room, 'Why did they shoot me?' And that's kind of hard so I try to put it in a kid's frame so I tell him, 'you're a superhero so God wanted to see your powers,' " said Laprea Brown.
In the last week there have been more than three dozen shootings citywide - seven of them fatal.
The gunman or gunmen in Mahaj's shooting are still on the loose.
Deborah Chappell lives on the same block where the shooting occurred.
"It's not the point of snitching, it's just the point of letting the family know who did it," said Chappell.
"I just pray somebody have a heart, have a soul, and somebody come forward," said Laprea Brown.
Haji's mother says because of where he was shot in his abdomen, he can't eat solid good and is on a feeding tube right now.
It will likely be another three to four weeks before he is released from the hospital.
Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to contact police.
