CHALMETTE, La. — A 14-year-old male juvenile is dead after being shot in Chalmette Thursday evening.
The sheriff's office says that Kelan Sartin, 18, of the 3800 block of Laplace Street in Chalmette, is wanted for second-degree murder.
According to the St. Bernard Sheriff’s Office, 911 dispatchers received a call about a shooting in the 3600 block of Golden Drive in Chalmette at about 7:30 p.m. on Thursday.
When deputies arrived, they found the 14-year-old shot multiple times and lying in a grassy courtyard between two buildings. St. Bernard Parish Sheriff James Pohlmann says EMS transported the victim to the University Medical Center hospital where he later died.
The sheriff says his department has seen an increase in violent crime in the parish.
“What happened here tonight in St. Bernard Parish has been happening across the metropolitan area,” said Sheriff Pohlmann at the scene. “We have been seeing an uptick in, young, particularly males and in some cases females, getting involved in some activity or carrying guns,…and as a matter of fact, we were working, looking for a suspect just around the corner. We discovered a male suspect carrying a concealed weapon and we also took him to jail.”
“We got to change. And not only change, we got to change the culture,” Pohlmann said. “We got to make sure that these younger kids growing up don’t become what we are seeing…whether they are perpetrators or victims.”
Anyone with information regarding this incident, or any other type of criminal activity in St. Bernard Parish is asked to call the Sheriff’s Office at (504) 271-2501, the Criminal Investigations Bureau’s tip hotline at (504) 271-TIPS or 8477, or Crimestoppers GNO at (504) 822-1111. Callers to the CIB tip hotline or Crimestoppers can remain anonymous and could be eligible for a cash award from Crimestoppers.