Man Shot Through Home's Front Window

PHILADELPHIA - Police said they are investigating an early morning shooting in the city's Frankford section.

A 47-year-old man was shot in the head when bullets came through the front window of the house at which he was staying on Dyre Street, Fox 29's Steve Keeley reported.

The man was still being treated Thursday afternoon at Frankford-Torresdale Hospital in Northeast Philadelphia, just a few blocks from the shooting scene.

Police said the man is going to be fine, and the first indication that he was not directly hit in the head was when he was able to walk into the emergency room.

As police investigate who fired the gun and why, they consider the 47-year-old man a victim. But they also told Fox 29 News they're looking into whether he was among a group smoking crack cocaine in that first-floor apartment when the shooting happened just after 5 a.m., Keeley reported.

Longtime Frankford residents said the sight of bullet holes and the sound of gunfire is are becoming common denominators in the downfall of their once proud place to live.

"There's been so many killings, robberies, shooting in Frankford. It don't make no sense," resident Tia C. Williams said.

"Things have gotten worse instead of better, absolutely," said resident Russell Mann. "Yeah, more crime, more drugs. They're selling drugs almost every other street corner down here."

"It was a nice neighborhood -- people come up from different 'hoods. That's great because everybody's 'Movin' On Up,'" Williams said, singing momentarily. "But it's not a surprise to me."

Neighbors told police the house was a crack house, and Thursday's shooting was just the latest violence there after another shooting and stabbing only days ago, Keeley reported.

"There's always somebody throwing something through the window. Yeah … it's a crack house," one man said.

The 47-year-old man who was struck got lucky. Innocent neighbors worry their luck at avoiding the violence is running out.

"We hear gunshots around here all night long. It happens every night. You hear people screaming and brawls in the street, all kinds of crazy stuff," Mann said.

"Everywhere I went it was a rape. Everywhere I went it was a shooting. Everybody I went with there was a robbery. This stuff's got to stop. We got to bring brotherly-hood back to Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love," Williams said.