Mom alarmed by daylight gunplay on Peabody street
PEABODY — Munroe Street is a short side street downtown with a handful of multifamily homes and apartments.
Many residents weren't at home when a shot was fired at an occupied vehicle in the midmorning hours Wednesday, but it startled those who were.
As she does every day, Gretchen Morin of Salem had dropped her 4-year-old daughter off at her mother's apartment in the neighborhood.
"That's alarming," Morin said yesterday, "My daughter telling me, 'Mom, there was a shooting over here.'"
Standing outside the apartment, Morin could point to the area where she said police found the bullet casing. Her mother and daughter were inside watching television when they heard the shot.
"I grew up in Peabody, so it is still unusual for this to happen so close to home, of course," she said.
Hector A. Batista, 19, of Lynn was arraigned yesterday in Peabody District Court on charges that he shot out the back window of an occupied car on Wednesday morning. No one was injured in the shooting.
Morin said her mother has been living off Munroe Street for more than a year and hasn't had a problem.
At nearby Pete's a Place restaurant on Central Street, Nicholas Howard, 26, didn't seem surprised when told of the gunshot.
The neighborhood has changed since his childhood on Munroe Court, just off Munroe Street, Howard said.
"Everybody knew everybody. Everybody was friends. Never had a problem," said Howard, who was working behind the counter. "We never locked our doors growing up."
He blamed the neighborhood's slide on a condominium complex built roughly a decade ago in the area.
It's definitely not as quiet, Howard said, not as safe.
Peabody police could not be reached for comment.
