A Wilkinsburg man is charged with attempted homicide and other crimes after police said he tried to shoot another man and narrowly avoided shooting a 3-year-old girl at Harrison’s Sheldon Park public housing complex last week.
Harrison police said after the shooting, Antonio Williams, 20, buckled the girl into a car seat and hid the gun underneath her before driving away.
Williams remained in the Allegheny County Jail on Sunday after failing to post $100,000 bond.
Police said they were dispatched for a report of gunshots at the housing complex on Wednesday.
Detective Joseph Signorella said an off-duty township police officer contacted him to report a suspicious SUV with a garbage bag over the license plate speeding on Springhill Road. The officer did not pursue the SUV but informed Signorella because it looked suspicious, according to a criminal complaint.
Signorella said police Chief Mike Naviglia of the Allegheny Valley Regional Police Department pulled over an SUV matching the description on Route 28. Inside the SUV were Williams, a woman and the 3-year-old girl.
Williams and the woman were removed from the SUV. Williams was a passenger, police said.
As they got out of the SUV, officers saw a gun magazine protruding from under a seat, according to the complaint.
Police asked the woman to remove the child from the car seat. When she did, officers saw a pistol underneath where the child had been sitting, the complaint said. The gun was determined to be loaded with one round in the chamber.
Police took Williams, the woman and the girl to the Harrison police station.
The woman told police she went to Sheldon Park to pick up her daughter and Williams came with her for protection, according to the complaint.
The SUV is registered to the woman. She told police she covered the license plate with a garbage bag because she didn’t want her child’s father knowing the number.
The woman said when her child’s father approached them, he was holding the girl with one hand and the other hand was in his pocket. After releasing their daughter, he continued to grab at something in his pocket, the woman said.
The woman said she heard gunshots and said both men had guns.
The woman said she grabbed her daughter and put her in the car seat, but didn’t buckle her in. She told police she instructed Williams to buckle her child in the car seat. At no point did she have the gun, she said.
Williams told police he buckled the girl into her car seat, but could not say how the gun ended up under the child, according to the complaint.
Police said Williams told them he went to Sheldon Park to make sure the woman wouldn’t get hurt, and he didn’t shoot his gun until he was shot at.
Police said Williams did not have a permit for his gun, and he told officers he got it from a friend.
Surveillance video from the scene showed Williams and the woman parking the SUV near the Deborah D. Booker Community Center, and getting out.
The child and her father can be seen walking toward them. The child is being carried by her father, but is eventually put down so she can walk.
The child walks a short distance before Williams is seen firing a gun at her father, according to the complaint. Police said the direction in which Williams was firing the gun was “in a direct path where the three-year-old child was located.”
The video shows the child’s father hiding behind an SUV before running away from the scene. Williams can be seen following the child’s father and continuing to shoot at him as he flees.
The video then shows Williams, the woman and the child getting into the SUV and driving off, the complaint said.
Williams doesn’t have an attorney listed. A preliminary hearing is set for Jan. 13 before Magisterial District Judge Carolyn S. Bengel in Brackenridge.
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