‘Unthinkable loss’: NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks out after 7-month-old girl killed by stray bullet

The incident, which occurred in broad daylight in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, has led to a city-wide manhunt for one of the suspects who fled the scene on a moped.

New York is dealing with an unspeakable tragedy.

A 7-month-old baby girl, identified by authorities as Kaori Patterson-Moore, was struck by a stray bullet and killed on Wednesday as her family pushed her stroller in Brooklyn. As shots rang out, Moore’s mother saw her bleeding, prompting her father to rush her to Woodhull Hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

“An unthinkable loss,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said in a post on X on Wednesday. “I’m grateful for the hospital staff who did everything they could and the NYPD for their ongoing work to find those responsible for this heinous murder. We cannot accept this violence as normal. Too many families have suffered this pain.”

During his news conference, Mamdani elaborated on his condolences to the family and reminded citizens that gun violence, especially gun violence that takes a young life, is not normal in New York City.

“There are no words that can mend the heartbreak this family is feeling now, no declaration strong enough to lift the grief they are now forced to carry, no embrace wide enough to heal the hole that has been left in their lives,” Mamdani said. “That sorrow is only deepened by the fact that is not the first family in our city to know this pain. Too many children have never grown up into becoming adults. Too many parents have had to bury those that they love the most.”

He added, “We cannot grow numb to this pain. And today is a devastating reminder of just how much more work there is to be done to combat gun violence across the city.”

Surveillance footage captured two men fleeing on a moped shortly after the shooting. A man on the back of the moped can be seen firing two shots toward a corner populated by children and several adults. As the suspects were fleeing the scene, the moped crashed into an oncoming car, knocking the man on the back of the moped off of the vehicle without his shoes.

The rear passenger is in custody as part of an unrelated investigation. Investigators are working to see if he’s connected to the shooting. The driver of the moped is still at large, and a massive NYPD search is underway for his capture.