Federal Hill Residents Demand More Police After Shootings Near School, Market

Tara had moved to Federal Hill only months before Saturday night's shooting, which grazed a 20-year-old man just before 10 p.m. across the street from Thomas Johnson Elementary-Middle School.

"I was definitely scared like I could have been walking to my apartment at that time," she said.

Surveillance video obtained by FOX45 News appears to show two shooters as their intended targets fled. The gunfire erupted near Cross Street Market, a stretch of Federal Hill that has absorbed a string of violent incidents. Four days earlier, a separate discharge had been reported in the neighborhood. Last December, a man was shot and killed in the parking lot of Federal Hill Preparatory School, also near Cross Street Market, on his 32nd birthday.

Jen Covino, public safety chair of the Federal Hill Neighborhood Association, placed the blame squarely on a police deployment strategy she called misaligned. "The Entertainment District Unit can't just simply come and swarm around Cross Street Market and be at the bars there," she said. "We need active policing throughout residential corridors here around our schools. We've now had two incidents at different elementary schools in Federal Hill that does nothing to attract the families we want to attract to be part of this community here in Baltimore."

Resident Phil Battaglin was direct: "I think we need more police. There's like no police out here."

The pressure had been building for months before Saturday's shooting. Community groups contacted Councilman Eric Costello after a brawl at East Cross and Charles streets went viral on social media. Liquor license commissioners who inspected the area concluded the situation mirrors earlier problems at Fells Point and that increased law enforcement is the only way to reduce further violence.

At a town hall on March 18 at Digital Harbor High School, led by State's Attorney Ivan Bates, Federal Hill resident Jennifer told officials she had listed her house for sale. "We've had four homicides in 15 months around Cross Street Market," she said.

Tara said she still worries about what comes next. "If they're still walking around here and this was targeted, it obviously makes me worry that it could happen again.