A 17-year-old boy was shot in the arm at a playground in Elmhurst, Queens, late Saturday night, and the person who pulled the trigger is still out there. Police say the shooting happened around 11:53 p.m. at Frank O'Connor Playground near 78th Street and Woodside Avenue, leaving the teen wounded and investigators searching for answers.
According to PIX11, police said the teenager was shot in the right arm by an unidentified person. He was taken to a local hospital for treatment, and the person responsible fled the scene in an unknown direction, leaving no immediate leads for officers to chase down.
Investigation Still Wide Open
The NYPD has not released a description of the shooter or said whether more than one person was involved, and no arrest has been announced. The investigation remains ongoing, per the same report, with detectives continuing to piece together what happened in the moments before gunfire broke out at the playground.
Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477), submit a tip online at crimestoppers.nypdonline.org, use the NYPD Crime Stoppers mobile app, or text 274637 (CRIMES) and enter TIP577. Spanish-speaking callers can reach investigators by dialing 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).
Not the Only Recent Queens Playground Shooting
This is not the only shooting to hit a Queens playground in recent memory. A separate incident reported by ABC7 New York described a 15-year-old shot during a dispute at a different Elmhurst playground, near 32nd Avenue and 89th Street, around 3:30 p.m. on a Saturday, with the teen struck in the torso and back. That outlet reported the victim was taken to Elmhurst Hospital and was expected to survive, while the suspects in that case also fled and the investigation there continued.
Another report from PIX11 described a 14-year-old shot near Rufus King Park in Jamaica, Queens, around 4:52 p.m. on a Sunday near 153 Jamaica Avenue. The ages, times, locations and injuries in these cases differ enough from Saturday night's Frank O'Connor Playground shooting that they should not be treated as connected incidents.
Citywide gun-seizure figures attributed to the NYPD indicate the department had removed thousands of firearms from city streets since the start of 2026, including hundreds seized in Queens, though that figure comes from a low-confidence snippet and has not been independently verified here. The department says its broader citywide crime data is updated weekly and can be reviewed through its public statistics pages, according to the NYPD.
For now, the search for whoever shot the Elmhurst teenager continues, with no suspect description or arrest announced as of Sunday morning.
