A group of children in day care managed to sleep through a nearby shooting and car crash in Alton Park that left one man in serious condition at the hospital Friday afternoon.
David Green, 31, was shot multiple times around noon as he drove on the 3800 block of Alton Park Boulevard and crashed in front of the Alton Park Church of Christ which hosts children for day care.
Officers arrived on scene and found Green slumped over in the car, and paramedics rushed him to a local hospital.
Rob Simmons, a spokesman for the Chattanooga Police Department, said the victim did speak to officers before being transported, but Simmons did not comment on what was said.
The car itself had crashed into and knocked over a small light pole and sat halfway onto the sidewalk facing oncoming traffic.
No suspect information was available, but Simmons said the suspect's vehicle was described to police as a silver Ford Expedition.
"There was an off-duty law enforcement officer in the area when the shooting occurred," Simmons said. "He is one of the witnesses that investigators are speaking to."
Despite the yellow crime scene tape criss-crossing the street, parents were allowed to pick up their children from the day care after the shooting.
Carla Cole said she was driving up from Alabama to pick up her granddaughter when the child's mother called to say something was wrong.
"I could hear it in her voice, she was concerned, so I told her I wasn't even close enough to the day care to tell her anything," she said.
She said the gravity of the situation became clear once she got to the church and saw the wreck.
"This is pretty serious to see a car slammed into a pole, a light pole that's practically bent over and touching the ground," she said.
"That's serious because I value life and some people don't. I just hate whatever happened to whoever's been victimized today."
Chattanooga has seen a string of shootings this week that injured several people and killed two.
Daniel Hendrix, 26, was shot and killed by police early Tuesday morning after refusing to drop a firearm he allegedly used earlier to threaten two women on the 300 block of Shawnee Trail. He was an off-duty corrections officer for the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office.
A 16-year-old girl was also shot and killed in a car on the 3500 block of Clio Avenue early Wednesday morning. No suspect has been identified in that case.
Officials of Blood Assurance, the region's blood center, said the recent shootings in Chattanooga also depleted the supply of platelets last weekend below the normal level.
"Due to violence in our community, we went through a lot of platelets," said Jay Baumgardner, a spokesman for the center.
Blood Assurance needs about 60 units of platelets every day, Baumgardner said, much of it for leukemia patients. Anyone looking for information about how to donate can visit the website at bloodassurance.org.
Staff writer Tyler Jett contributed to this story.
Contact staff writer Emmett Gienapp at egienapp@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6731. Follow him on Twitter @emmettgienapp.