The Trenton Times published the following article on April 9, 2013. To read the full article, click here.

Weekend shootings in Trenton leave 5 people injured, police say

By Alex Zdan/The Times 
on April 09, 2013 at 7:45 AM

TRENTON – Police have identified the 22-year-old city man fatally shot during a drive-by gunfight on Home Avenue Friday night.

Sidiq Howlen was standing outside on the 100 block of Home shortly before 8:45 p.m. when he was shot in the head during the exchange of gunfire, police said.

“We have video, and it shows a car driving by and the shots coming from the car,” Sgt. Mark Kieffer said yesterday.

Howlen had just walked away from a crowd of people gathered in front of a home next to a convenience store on the block. It appears someone from that crowd returned fire, shooting at the car as it drove by, Kieffer said.

A 49-year-old man walking headed into his apartment on Home Avenue was shot in the leg. Police did not know he was shot until he approached officers guarding the crime scene, Kieffer said.

Howlen was pronounced dead at the scene, while the wounded man was taken by ambulance to Capital Health Regional Medical Center for treatment. He was expected to survive his injury.

Police are investigating whether Howlen’s death has any connection to a possible shooting at a carnival being held off Cass Street Friday night.

“We can’t rule it out,” Kieffer said.

The carnival was shut down by Mercer County Sheriff’s officers working security shortly after the gunfire was heard, about an hour before Howlen was killed. No one was injured and no evidence of a shooting was found. Sheriff’s officers did hear the shots, however.

“They heard some shots fired, they didn’t witness anyone,” Undersheriff Pedro Medina said yesterday.

Howlen’s death is Trenton’s seventh homicide of 2013. Gun violence in the city left five other people wounded last weekend, including the 49-year-old shot on Home Avenue and another man shot in the stomach on South Clinton Avenue about two hours before Howlen was killed.

The South Clinton Avenue shooting was also a drive-by, Kieffer said, and while police believe the 23-year-old man wounded there was the intended target of the shooting just before 7 p.m., they do not believe the crime is connected to the later homicide.

Shootings continued throughout the weekend, with an especially uncooperative victim unwilling to help police find her shooter or even give her own name, police said. Initially, the woman even refused a trip to the hospital, Kieffer said.

Officers were sent to the Rowan Towers apartment complex on the 600 block of West State Street around 11 p.m. Saturday, where they found the 20-year-old woman with a gunshot wound to her lower left leg. Police left after she refused to cooperate.

Around 1 a.m., she was dropped off by car at Capital Health Regional Medical Center, where the leg wound was treated and she was listed in stable condition. Police returned to the hospital to speak with her then, but the victim still refused to give any information about the shooting.

“No luck,” Kieffer said.

Two more people were shot Sunday evening outside a convenience store on the 200 block of Walnut Avenue, when a man on foot opened fire on the storefront, police said.

A 19-year-old store employee was shot in his hand, while a 56-year-old man was hit in the foot. Neither injury was believed to be life-threatening, police said. The motive in that shooting remains unclear.

All the cases remain under investigation. No arrests have been made in the killing and full suspect descriptions were not available in any of the cases yesterday. Anyone with information on any of the crimes should call police at (609) 989-4170, or the Confidential Tip Line at (609) 989-3663.

Contact Alex Zdan at azdan@njtimes.com or (609) 989-5705.