Jordan Tobin rose from his sleep when he heard a loud bang in the early hours of Thursday morning.
Then he heard another. And another. And about half a dozen more after that.
When the powerful blows suddenly gave way to the squeaky tires of a running vehicle, Tobin ran from his bedroom to the adjoining lobby.
“There were bullets everywhere. Glass everywhere. Holes everywhere. It’s just not a scene where you want to enter the lobby of your apartment building, “Tobin said.
He ran back to his apartment, grabbed his phone and called 911 around 2:45 p.m.
“I immediately called the police and described what exactly happened [and] he told them it was absolutely urgent to get here as soon as possible, “Tobin said.
Tobin said no one showed up until 6 a.m. – more than three hours after the first call.
Tobin ran to his lobby after hearing loud bangs. He found himself strewn with bullet holes. (Jordan Tobin / Facebook)
Const. James Cadigan, a spokesman for the Royal Newfoundland Police, said police received several calls about “shots-like noise” in the area at 2:45 a.m., but found only a burning car nearby.
“The investigation at the time did not find any evidence or locate any damage related to these reports [of gunshots]”Kadigan said.
Kadigan said it was too early to know if the burning car was linked to the shooting, but it was less than 300 meters from the apartment complex.
Police finally arrived at the apartment building after 6:20 a.m. when they received a report of “property damage believed to have been shot.”
Police remained at the scene of the shooting at this Thorburn Road apartment building throughout Thursday. (Danny Arseno / CBC)
That’s not good enough for Tobin, who said he gave his address to police, told them the shots had been fired at his building, and waited – surrounded by bullet holes and broken glass – for more than an hour. He does not understand how the RNC did not find evidence of a shooting after his initial call. He worries about what could have happened if the shooter was still in the building.
“It doesn’t make me feel safe. I doubt it makes anyone feel safe,” Tobin said.
Police are urging anyone with information or video of the area around the time of the shooting to come forward.
“Reckless” shootings are on the rise
Thursday’s shooting was at least the third in a series of gun violence in recent weeks. That comes five days after a Paradise shooter left a man in hospital and 13 days after shootings in the Galway neighborhood of St. John’s.
No arrests were made in any of the three cases. Kadigan said they are currently being investigated as separate incidents and noted that the latest shooting is still at an early stage of the investigation.
“It certainly looks like there’s been a trend of gun crimes lately,” Cadigan said. “You can just look back a few months ago, when the street crime department opened essentially a firearms chain. We seized more than 120 firearms – illegal firearms – as well as 3D printing devices. So we know that these criminal networks are present and we are working to find them. “
An officer from the Royal Newfoundland Police took pictures of bullet holes on 78 Thorburn Rd. Police were busy Thursday Thursday cutting bullets off the walls around the building’s lobby. (Danny Arseno / CBC)
Kadigan said it was obvious that these “networks” were operating out of desperation, leading to bold and reckless actions.
No one is more brazen than Thursday’s shooting, which left bullet holes in the lobby walls that passed next to people’s apartments. Tobin said there were four bullets in a wall behind an apartment belonging to a woman and her teenage daughter.
Tobin said he was fine to continue living in the building, but there was a report of the shooter or shooters.
“Shake your head. Stop being so careless. Stop being so reckless. If you don’t care about your own life, at least take care of the lives of others,” he said. “You’re putting a lot of innocent people at risk. It’s just completely unnecessary.”
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