“The doctors are not able to give us whether the child will live,” Ms. Lung said.

She asked that the suspect, Michael Quiles, 27, be denied bail because of the recklessness of his actions.

Image Jaheen Hunter, who on his fifth birthday was hit in the head by a stray bullet, which entered his brain.

Mr. Quiles had been paroled in October after serving prison time for attempted kidnapping, Ms. Lung said.

In that case, according to court documents released on Wednesday, Mr. Quiles was charged with abducting someone just after midnight in Albany in 2009 to try to force that person’s brother to give Mr. Quiles the contents of a safe as ransom. During the kidnapping, someone working with Mr. Quiles repeatedly stabbed a woman and broke her orbital bone and nose, the documents say.

Within months of being paroled, Ms. Lung said, “he’s back out on the street and he has a gun on him.”

“He chose to shoot that gun when people are there,” she said.

On Monday, Jaheen had been celebrating his birthday with his father, Charles Hunter, and was being walked to a waiting car in front of Mr. Hunter’s home on Washington Avenue near 167th Street in the Morrisania neighborhood.