10-year-old girl wounded, man killed in Jersey City double shooting

JERSEY CITY, New Jersey (WABC) -- Two suspects are under arrest after a 19-year-old man was killed and a 10-year-old girl wounded in a double shooting in Jersey City late Sunday.

The shooting was reported near Ocean and Van Nostrand Avenues just after 10 p.m.

The man, who appeared to be the intended target, was pronounced dead at the scene. He has been identified as 19-year-old Jimmy Gregory of Jersey City.

It is the sixth murder in Jersey City this year.

The girl, Rayana Phillips, was in a car with her 2-year-old sister and another adult when she was shot in the lower left part of her body, according to the Hudson County Prosecutor's Office. She was taken to Jersey City Medical Center, where she underwent surgery and is in stable condition.

Rayana's mother, Rasheeda Albright, told Eyewitness News she left her the girls in the double-parked car with her friend while she ran into a takeout restaurant to get French fries for the children.

She said gunfire erupted, and she told them to duck. But there was no response at first. She came back to find her daughter covered in blood, and unaware of what had happened, she believed both her daughters were dead.

"She said, 'Mom, my back hurt, my back hurts,'" Albright said. "So I said, 'Turn around,' and when she turned around, that's when I realized she had blood on her shirt and a hole in her back."

She is having a difficult time processing the situation.

"She's OK, but right now, she's in and out," Albright said. "She's in a lot of pain. She got shot in the lower back, like where it's close to her spine and her kidney. They had to cut her colon out. She's waking up in pain."

Jersey City police plainclothes officers in an unmarked vehicle happened to be in the area and spotted two suspects fleeing. They chased them on foot and took them into custody, police said.

The suspects, 21-year-old Corey Pickett and 21-year-old Jonathan Ferrera, both of Jersey City, are both charged with murder, attempted murder, unlawful firearms possession and resisting arrest.

Two handguns were recovered.

"It don't make no sense, it don't make no sense," the girls' grandmother, Claire Betha, said. "The gun violence has to stop, because every child belongs to somebody, whether bad or good. Every child belongs to somebody. It has to stop."