A Baltimore police officer shot a 14-year-old boy carrying what the police said was a replica gun on Wednesday, the anniversary of Freddie Gray’s funeral and the riot that later spread through the city.

The boy is expected to recover.

“It’s not lost on me what 27 April means to this city, means to this police department, what it means to me personally,” police commissioner Kevin Davis told reporters near the scene. “So I wish I wasn’t here describing to you all what appears to be a very unusual circumstance of a [14]-year-old young man making a decision to leave his home with a replica gun in his hand.” Davis had described the boy on Wednesday as being 13 years old. But on Thursday, his mother Volanda Young identified him as Dedric Colvin, and clarified that he is 14 and in the eighth grade.

“Two detectives assigned to our intelligence section were driving down the street here and they saw a young man with a firearm, or what looked like a firearm, in his hand,” Davis said. “They identified themselves as police officers to this young man. The young man took off on foot with the gun in his hand and the foot chase was probably a good 100-plus yards, rounded the corner here, the young man never dropped what appeared to be a firearm and one of our two police officers discharged his firearm at the young man, striking him non-fatally.”

Davis said the injuries were in the “lower extremities”. Young told the Baltimore Sun that her son was shot twice, once in the leg and once in the shoulder.

The officers were in an unmarked car and were not wearing uniforms and Davis could not say how many shots had been fired, although two police markers used to mark identify shell casings could be seen.

“He had every opportunity to drop the gun, he had every opportunity to stop, put his hands in the air, comply with the instructions of the police officers,” Davis said. He added that he could not not say whether the young man made any motion towards the officers with the gun or did anything to make them fear for their safety.

Names of the shooting officer and the boy have not been released. Davis said the shooting was under investigation.

Police cars at the scene. Photograph: Baynard Woods/The Guardian

“Our special investigations response team is out here,” Davis said. “You know we take these investigations very, very seriously in Baltimore. It’s the most important investigation we do to investigate police actions and any police-involved shootings.”

Another young man riding a scooter on a nearby street said he was friends with the boy who was shot. “We play basketball together, football together, I know him very well.”

“He was in my class. He got shot three times by police. It was a BB gun,” he said. “That’s how it is these days, you can’t do nothing.”

Witnesses said that the mother came up on the scene, screaming. “They slammed her and locked her up,” one said.

Davis said the mother had not been arrested but was being questioned.

“His mom approached some police officers and she made an admission to the police officers that she knew that her son left their home with what she described as a BB gun in his hand,” Davis said.

The commissioner had just been at a sparsely attended event that Baltimore mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake called a “reconciliation” at Mondawmin Mall, where police clashed with high school students during the riots on 27 April last year.

At another event in front of the re-opened CVS that was set on fire that day, a 12-year-old boy named Frank spoke. “The police don’t care. As long as you got one of these around your waist,” he said gesturing at his belt with a large buckle. “Or something around your neck they gonna arrest you, say ‘you selling drugs or you stole them.”

“I am certainly glad this young man is going to survive or appears he’s going to survive from his injuries,” Davis said. “No police officer in Baltimore wants to shoot a 13-year-old, but police officers here and elsewhere are charged by us, by our community with going after bad guys with guns.”