♪ inside the kingdom got a glimmer in my eyeee and a] tonight, we of america's most dangerous cities, philadelphia. >> 14 people were shot, three of those people have now died. >> where the number of gun deaths has hit a grim new record. >> philly is supposed to be the city of brotherly love. but it's like you got brothers killing brothers. >> caught on both sides of the gun, young lives. >> i shot my first gun at 11. >> an entire generation scarred. >> show of hands if you know anyone who's been murdered. >> plus the hard reality as illegal weapons flood the streets. >> it's easier to get a gun than

a driver's license. >> and the hard questions facing law enforcement. >> part of what i hear you say,think, is there are problems in philadelphia, but i ain't it? >> no, i wouldn't say that. >> this special edition of "nightline," "guns in america: bullets over philadelphia," will be right back. that's good for you? try nature's bounty jelly bean vitamins. good-for-you nutrients in a tastier-for-you form. more sweet dreams. more flavorful immune support.

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good evening. thank you for joining us. tonight we focus on philadelphia, the city of brotherly love. but also a city plagued by one of the deadliest epidemics in america, gun violence. and no one is paying a heavier price than the city's young people. children caught in the crossfire of a crisis with no end in sight. >> i'm still here. i'm here to tell the story. i was the one that got to live. >>ll, playg ball is a brief respite from the dangers that stalk him. what did you do when you saw the beam on your shirt? >> i turned and just kept run. atllet went through the shirt.

>> reporter: the 16-year-old surviving a near-fatal shooting last summer. walking home with friends in west philadelphia after a pickup basketball game, a group of young people approached them and clashed. how does it go from guys arguing to someone pulling a gun? >> it was just the way the world is nowadays. it's like people feel like they've got to have a gun to have power. >> reporter: one bullet grazing his shoulder. it was a near miss. rasan was lucky. too often in philadelphia, someone else's child is not. >> a very dangerous night. >> 14 people were shot, three of those people have now died. >> reporter: the city of brotherly love bleeding in bullets. >> you just hear it. they just start shooting. >> reporter: in a nation where gun violence has become an epidemic from city to city, philadelphia setting its own grim record. 562 people shot dead last year. the most ever in its history.

hundreds more than new york or los angeles. >> someone must have got hit. >> philly supposed to be a city of brotherly love. but you got brothers killing brothers. >> reporter: tonight we go inside the brutal reality of gun violence with the most vulnerable, the young. >> i literally watched my blood leak out. >> reporter: digging into why this keeps happening. you were a shooter, right? >> allegedly. >> reporter: the city's leaders fighting a battle many admit they are losing. >> we're losing generations. >> if we have another horrible year, then we have all failed. >> reporter: while community leaders figuratively and literally doing all they can to stop the bleeding. >> our kids are dying slowly. our kids have no hope. >> reporter: this housing project in west philly is where rasan spent most of his childhood. the neighborhood one of the deadliest in the city. the rising high school junior imagining life beyond his

hometown. what's the dream? >> play football. if football doesn't work out, i want to join the army. i just feel like i'm made to be on the battlefield. >> reporter: in many ways, he already is. >> i say a little prayer to myself when i'm walking. >> if i may ask, what's the prayer? >> i ask god to watch over me while i'm walking and make sure i make it home safely. can't even have fun nowadays. because you've got to worry about a stray bullet. >> reporter: young black men are disproportionately killed and wounded by guns in philadelphia, comprising 75% of those shot. gun violence tragically the leading cause of death for black males between the ages of 15 and 34. for rasan and his friends, those aren't simply statistics, they're names and faces they know. so you check on each other every couple of days? >> every day. >> every hour of the day.

>> group chat. >> you have a group chat? >> we always ask, where y'all at, what y'all doing? >> show of hands if you know anyone who's ever been shot. show of hands if you know anyone who's ever been murdered. show of hands if it were a relative or friend that was murdered. have you ever thought about carrying a gun snurs. >> no. >> no. >> that's not us. we don't -- we don't got to carry a gun to express ourselves. >> how do you stay protected, stay safe? >> stick together. >> stick together, watch each other's backs. >> watch our backs. >> reporter: the sting of a bullet touching the life of rasan in more ways than one. >> this gives me butterflies. i haven't been back ever since. so it feels very different. >> reporter: less than a year after rasan's close call, his 19-year-old friend ajenai stinson was shot three times in a random incident at the same

west park apartment complex. >> the first pop, i'm thinking it hit the metal because i heard the bullet drop. so once that happened, i instantly just froze. i ran that way and went up the steps. and i kept running. >> runnin for your life? >> yeah. i was terrified. >> reporter: returning here now requires armed security guards and emotional support from her pastor and mentor, reverend aron campbell. >> i buried five mentees over the years that were just as close to me. so i was like, oh my god, not another one, not her. >> reporter: just 82 days into the year, ajenai quietly became the 460th victim of gun violence. >> 19-year-old girl gets shot three times, nearly bleeds to death, and there's no mention in the local newspaper, there's no mention on the local tv station? >> our young people of color are not being valued. until we all come together and begin valuing them, this will

not change. and in fact, it will get worse. >> reporter: reverend aaron created level up in 2018, a program developed to mentor young people in philadelphia. recently the group provided a home for ajenai and her family. inside level up's headquarters, this local church has become a safe haven for young people, including her and rasan. the pastor wears many hats. friend, father, therapist. favorite uncle. >> there is a systemic neglect of young people of color. the schools, underfunded, overcrowded. the school to prison pipeline, that's a reality that just can't be neglected. and there needs to be change. >> so how can a preacher of a

modest-sized church with very cool tattoos impact any of that? >> i think talk is cheap. i just want to let the work speak for itself. these are diamonds in the rough, and they need to be humanized again. >> reporter: aaron has seen the trauma on both sides of a gun. helping the wounded and those who pulled the trigger. >> every gathering, we collect knives, tasers, mace. kids have to carry weapons just to feel safe. but we're always teaching that violence is never the answer. >> some of the kids who come here have shot somebody. what do they fell you? >> self-defense. "she shot at me, so i shot back." >> some of this is described as social media beefs turned violent. >> we live in this day now, someone can look at someone's instagram, slide in their dms, and just begin with the hate. >> i got shot by my best friend. it was over a girl. >> reporter: for ledonisq

araujo, the 25-year-old self-proclaimed bloods gang member knows firsthand how quickly the streets can turn on someone in philadelphia. the bullet's still here? >> yeah, i can still feel it. >> may i? >> yeah, sure. right here. >> oh my gosh. wow. >> i done been in jail, i done been on the run. and i done been dead. three places i don't want to go no more. >> i don't know whether to say you've been fortunate or you've been cursed. >> honestl, i wouldn't know what to call it. i would call it life. >> reporter: q said the streets began to pull him in by age 12. >> i shot my first gun at 11. >> at a shooting range? >> no. the moment you hit your peak at 12, that's when everything hits you. the world hits you. and you really got to realize, either i'm going to be in it or i'm going to be on the side of it. >> reporter: now q, also a member of level up, is focused on life on the other side of violence.

what changed? >> me. i didn't want to be dead. i didn't want to, like -- i didn't want to put my mother through that pain. >> our quandary here is, heal people, heal people. as they're experiencing healing, they're going back into their communities as agents of healing. >> reporter: but for ajenai, the road to healing is not easy. for months she's been doing grueling physical therapy. in talking to you, i certainly sense resilience, i sense kindness, i sense optimism. i don't sense fear or anger. >> i'm not really angry with anyone. not even the shooter. because like i say -- >> come on, a stranger shot you for no reason and you're not angry with him? >> yeah, i don't have that type of hate in my heart for anyone. >> none? >> none, nah, not anyone. coming up, tough questions for philly's leaders. >> part of what i hear you say,

i think, is there are problems in philadelphia but i ain't it? >> no, i wouldn't say that. >> we've fallen short, quite frankly. >> and more mayhem and heartbreak. >> we have multiple victims, we got hundreds of people -- >> you can be somebody, so full of life, and it can be gone just with the snap of a finger. ...the burning, the itching. the stinging. my skin was no longer mine. emerge tremfyant®. with tremfya®, most people saw 90% clearer skin at 16 weeks. the majority of people saw 90% clearer skin even at 5 years. tremfya® is the first medication of its kind also approved for adults with active psoriatic arthritis... ...and it's 6 doses a year after 2 starter doses. serious allergic reactions may occur. tremfya® may increase your risk of infections and lower your ability to fight them. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms or if you had a vaccine or plan to. emerge tremfyant®. with tremfya®...

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"nightline" continues. here again, byron pitts. >> shots fired. >> i need a supervisor on the scene. >> reporter: just days after we filmed in philadelphia -- >> somebody got [ bleep ] shot. >> reporter: there was a mass shooting at the city's iconic

south street, killing three and injuring 11. >> multiple people shot. >> reporter: 19-year-old quani thorpe, a member of level up, was there. >> you just hear it, they just start shooting. i got pushed into like this bar, like this security guy was grabbing kids, pushing them, getting them in the bar for safety. >> reporter: the next day he learned his cousin, alexis, 27 years old, was one of the three people killed that night. >> it still blows my mind, like how can you not be here? i still call her phone, still text her, just to hear her voice message. everybody say the world is a better place or the world should be a better place. why not make it a better place? why not stop the violence? >> reporter: but for the city's top leaders -- >> yesterday was a dark day for

philadelphia. >> reporter: solutions are few and far between. >> this act of violence is obviously no reflection on who we are as philadelphians, what we stand for, or our resilience. >> reporter: it may not an reflection, but it is the reality. four suspects were arrested and charged in the mass shooting. multiple guns were recovered, including a ghost gun. >> so this room is our gun room, where we archive our weapons. >> reporter: semiautomatic, automatic, legal, illegal, ghost guns, handguns, rifles, revolvers. philadelphia police commissioner danielle outlaw has seen it all. talking to us in february. >> this speaks to the volume of guns we're seeing. >> reporter: what's in this room is nothing compared to what's available on the streets. last year the police confiscated almost 6,000 guns. this year they've already confiscated more than 2,500. >> it's pretty easy to get a gun here in the state. >> how easy? >> easier to get a gun than to

get a driver's license. they end up in the hands of folks illegally. someone legally purchasing the firearm, then passing it off. we've seen an increase in ghost guns. >> reporter: two years ago, the philadelphia police hired outlaw as the force's first black female leader. in 2021, 100% of the fatal victims aged 17 and under were black. what does that say to you? >> we're losing our children. we're losing generations. a lot of the trauma we're seeing is generational. our victims, as you mentioned, are becoming younger and younger. but so are our shooters. >> reporter: outlaw's top law enforcement partner is district attorney larry crassnick. >> changemakers take a lot of heat. >> reporter: the former defense attorney is a self-described reform prosecutor. >> this is the office where we do not think one size fits all. >> reporter: like many aggressive prosecutors, both praised and a lightning rod for criticism. critics point to rising crime

rates and a low contradiction rate for violent crimes while he's been in office. so looking at homicides, record high in philadelphia. the victims are becoming younger, the perpetrators are becoming younger. that's occurred on your watch. >> right. it is occurring on my watch, it is occurring across the united states. >> how do you explain the surge in gun violence in philadelphia, and how do you reduce it? >> it has a ton to do with the incredible disruption of the pandemic. you simultaneously have this pandemic fears, related to - unrest. this is a witch's brew. >> what do you think are the top reasons why? >> domestic violence is a driver. narcotic sales. social media beefs or arguments were three main drivers. we've fallen short, quite frankly. and there is an obligation to do better and to do more. >> reporter: recent data show that arrests have only been made in 18% of nonfatal shootings.

outlaw is trying to change that. she's formed a special unit that will use forensics to focus on nonfatal shootings. >> we're starting to look at nonfatal shootings as something as serious as a homicide. if we put the same level of priority on the nonfatal shootings, i am confident that we will reduce our homicides. because off the times the shooters for the nonfatal shootings are some of the same shooters for our homicides as well. >> reporter: commissioner outlaw and d.a. krasner have not always been aligned. commissioner outlaw has been critical of your office in the past saying you're not prosecuting illegal gun cases aggressively enough. >> i guess we have a fundamental difference of opinion. i think when you kill somebody with a gun, that is even more serious than when you carry a gun, which you'll find in almost every city where there are progressive prosecutors. is that because there's a very, very low rate of police solving murders by gun and solving

shootings, there's a real effort to talk about something else. when those cases are not solved by police, there is nothing for me to prosecute. >> what about of what i hear you say, i think, is there are problems in philadelphia, but i ain't it. >> no, i wouldn't say that. you know, i would not say that. i think that we have a sad history in philadelphia of governmental dysfunction. >> how should children in the streets of philadelphia take that, if two adults in leadership positions aren't aligned, don't agree? >> we disagree on some areas. but we agree in many other areas. we both agree that gun violence has to stop. it crushes me that young people believe that they have to carry a gun to be safe. >> what do you say to those teenagers who are walking to school, afraid they're going to get shot, killed? >> i understand your fear. i know that it is real. we need to support you in ways that we have not before, with real funding for education, for

job programs, with real opportunities to fulfill your potential. it's our turn to step up. >> reporter: while police and politicians grasp for solutions, back in west philadelphia, children are still dying. dreams are still delayed. kids have to grow up sooner than they should and be their own rainbow in their own clouds. what does a safe, gun-free philadelphia look like to you? >> if philly was free and safe from guns, everybody would look at it the same way i look at it. brighter. a place of love, as it should be. i feel some love here in philly. isn't working at its best. taking metamucil everyday can help. metamucil psyllium fiber, gels to trap and remove the waste that weighs you down.

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♪ it was one week ago that we finished filming this report. in the seven days since, there have been at least 49 shootings in philadelphia. this old and grand american city where the declaration of independence and the constitution were signed. all across our country, people insist we can do better. here's my question. when? that's "nightline" for this evening. thanks for the company, america. stay safe. good night.