A premature baby is in critical but stable condition after its mother was shot and killed in a northwest Toronto neighbourhood, forcing an emergency C-section to deliver the infant.

Candice Rochelle Bobb, 35, of Mississauga, Ont., was 20 weeks pregnant – about halfway to a full term – when shots were fired at a car late Sunday night in the Rexdale area.

Bobb, who was sitting in the vehicle’s back seat, was struck in the chest and rushed to a local hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

Police say Bobb’s baby was delivered by an emergency C-section. The infant was in critical but stable condition as of Monday morning.

The shocking death comes at a time when Toronto is dealing with a spike in gun violence.

No other occupants of the vehicle were injured, according to Det-Sgt. Mike Carbone, who appealed for witnesses Monday morning.

Asked whether Bobb was targeted, he responded: “This is very early in the investigation. I can say for some reason only known to the offender at this point, that that vehicle was certainly targeted.”

He added it was too early in the investigation to say how many suspects may have been involved or whether they were in a vehicle or on foot when the shots were fired.

CP24’s Cam Wooley says homicide detectives are on the scene and reviewing video from the area.

Wooley says forensics officers have located seven shell casings ejected from a semi-automatic pistol, spread over a two-block area.

He said police have told him that two out of the three other vehicle occupants are co-operating with investigators.

“The area where this occurred, the Jamestown area, has been plagued by gun violence in the past,” he added.

Uptick in gun violence

Divisional Supt. Ron Taverner said the woman’s death comes as police deal with a spike in gun violence.

There have been 29 homicides in Toronto so far this year, after 56 in all of 2015.

Toronto Police preliminary statistics show there have been 135 shootings in the city so far in 2016, compared to 84 by this time last year. That’s a 60 per cent increase.

In 2015, there were only 60 shootings by this time. By mid-May 2013, there had been 78.

"There's no doubt that there's obviously more guns on the street,” Taverner said. “More young people and people in general carrying guns.”

"We're all kind of in shock,” he added. “The whole city is outraged that this can happen. Yes, this woman was pregnant, and hopefully this baby survives, but any shooting is very tragic. Anything where people are going to that level of violence is just disgusting."

Toronto Mayor John Tory visited Rexdale on Monday and met with residents to show his support for the community after the shooting, which he called “completely unacceptable.”

The mayor asked people to co-operate with police to help crack down on gun violence.

“I think we’ve got to get citizens a lot more engaged in making sure they provide all the information they can to police so we can stop these kinds of things from happening,” Tory said.

“We’ve got to stop those kids from having those guns, we’ve got to limit access to those guns, we’ve got to make sure those kids understand it is not fun or it’s not a status symbol to carry a gun.”

With files from CP24’s Cam Wooley and The Canadian Press