1 year later, brazen daylight gunfight remains unsolved

It's been a year since agunfightin the middle of the city in broad daylight kicked off a season of heightenedconcern about violence in Hamilton.

The Main Street East shootoutremains unsolved, and there is no information from police about progress in the investigation,despite significant public scrutiny and attention onthe May 17incident, which took place a few hours after another shooting incident a few blocks away.

Caught on a passing dashcam, the gunfight involved two men alongMain Street Eastshooting at each other, with others running from the line of fire,as Sunday traffic rolled by.

The incidentmarked the beginningof a violent summer of unusual, sometimes brazen, gun violence for Hamilton that alarmed the mayor and several city councilors.

How lucky were passers-by they weren't hit?That was evidentwhenpolice askedpeople to check their cars for bullet holes.

The chair of the police board said the incident was part of an "unacceptable" spike in gun violence, but a year later, with few solidnumbers from policeabout shooting trends, it's still not clear if there is a spike.

But there was concern:At least two community forums, a mayor's task force and a gun amnesty program sought to find answers to some of that concern.The event also promptedthe mayor to suggest the city ban on guns.

"I've been around here a while and never in my time have Iseen this many incidents of gunplay on the streets," said Fred Eisenberger last fall.

While police promised to increase their visibility in the city's Ward 3 and attended a community rally called in response to the daylight shooting, they haven't shared information publicly about any progress they've made on the Main and East case.

The anniversary arrives as police are investigating another shooting, where a downtown bouncer was killed outside a club where he worked early in the morning on Friday. It was the city's 10th homicide of 2016 so far.

When asked Monday,Hamilton Police did not say what, if any, progress has been made in figuring out who was involved in the Main and East gunfight over the past year.

"Any amount of gun violence or violent crime in our community is something we take serious," said Const. Stephen Welton.

'A prime location'

The shootout last May 17 left bullet holes, abandoned shell casings and damage to a car and business near Main Street East and East Ave.

The business that took a bullet, Marz Paint, has closed and a secondhand shop has opened in its place. The paint store's owner told CBC Hamilton last summer she was shaken by the event. She did not respond to an interview request on Monday.

Scott Jamieson manages that secondhand store, New2You, and said he hasn't noticed anything to make him alarmed about the neighbourhood.

"This joint opened up and it was a prime location," he said.

'Investigating young black males'

Police released a video image that showed a moment from the shooting and later released the entire dashcamfootage:

Police said then they believed there were two black men involved.

Watch the dashcam video below. (Can't see the video? Watch here.)

Chief Glenn De Caire used the incident as an exampleto make a case for carding in a letter to the public safety minister.

But the argument, that the community would expect police to be stopping and talking to all young black men near the scene of the shooting, sounded like a "textbook description of racial profiling" to the Ontario Human Rights Commission.

Is the trend getting worse?

Though the chief spoke reassuringly about trends being in line with previous years, numbers obtained by CBC Hamilton from the Hamilton Police Service showed that the number of shootings in the city through the end of September appeared to be at a six-year high.

That didn't line up with the then-chief's statement that gun violence wasn't any worse in 2015 than in previous years. But the service didn't explain the discrepancy.

Hamilton Police did not provide numbers to put2015 in context compared toprevious years.

Eisenberger said it was the nature of the gun violence in 2015 that was worrisome.

Det. Sgt. Joe Stewart told CBC Hamilton three weeks after a shooting that killed an 18-year-old that police were "working hard" and "using all the resources necessary" to try to solve the crime.

Among the other incidents last summer and fall that raised community concern:

• May 13, 2015:Shots fired openly on the street on Delawana Drive.
• May 17, 2015: Another gun incident hours before the Main/East gunfight, at King and Ashley streets.
• June 13, 2015: Triple shooting on MacNab St.
• July 27, 2015: More gunshots fired in North End.
• Aug. 8, 2015: Daytime shooting near Wentworth St. South and Rutherford Ave.
• Aug. 12, 2015: Shooting near MacNab St. N. and Simcoe St. West that killed 18-year-old Shariek Douse.
• Sept. 17, 2015: Shooting involving a modified flare gun in a corridor at a Tim Hortons at Barton and Chapple Street involving two teens under 16.

kelly.bennett@cbc.ca | @kellyrbennett