WISH Photographer Shot at House Fire

WISH Indianapolis photographer Kevin Hankins was shot in the back while reporting at a house fire early this morning. He was taken to Methodist Hospital.

“He was treated and released,” WISH president and general manager Jeff White said. “He’s doing fine and is in good spirits.”

As firefighters put out the blaze on the city’s east side, someone began shooting a .22-caliber weapon into the crowd gathered near the fire. A free-lance photographer representing the fire department was also hit but was not severely injured.

"I was just gathering shots around the scene and then all of sudden heard a pop and felt something on my left back,” Hankins said on the WISH Web site. “And then the medic behind me said, ‘You don't got to be so jumpy.’ I said, ‘I just got hit by something,’ and I lifted up my shirt and he said, ‘You're bleeding and were shot by something.’”

No arrests have been made at this time.

WISH is a LIN TV-owned CBS affiliate.

Michael Malone

Michael Malone, senior content producer at B+C/Multichannel News, covers network programming, including entertainment, news and sports on broadcast, cable and streaming; and local broadcast television. He hosts the podcasts Busted Pilot, about what’s new in television, and Series Business, a chat with the creator of a new program, and writes the column “The Watchman.” He joined B+C in 2005. His journalism has also appeared in The New York Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Playboy and New York magazine.