New Florence man accused of threatening family with claw hammer

A New Florence man is accused of possibly spraining a state trooper’s thumb during a Saturday night domestic incident that spilled into the street and required help from witnesses and neighbors, according to court papers.

Police were called to 19th Street in New Florence around 9:15 p.m. for a report of a domestic among several family members in which William Jacob Teeter, 26, reportedly was wielding a claw hammer and threatening others with it.

A trooper who arrived at the scene talked Teeter, who appeared intoxicated, into dropping the hammer. But police said Teeter threatened to beat up the trooper “with his bare hands, as well as he was going to do the same to (the trooper) as what happened between Ray Shetler and (St. Clair Police Officer Lloyd) Reed,” investigators wrote in court papers.

Shetler, 39, was acquitted in the 2015 fatal shooting of Reed in New Florence. Reed was responding to a domestic call at a home Shelter then shared with a girlfriend.

While the trooper who responded to Saturday’s incident awaited backup, Teeter is accused of shoving a relative. The trooper took Teeter into custody with the help of two of Teeter’s relatives and a neighbor. During the struggle is when Teeter is accused of bending the trooper’s thumb back, according to court papers.

After Teeter was handcuffed, his relatives told police they were threatened by him after they refused to give him money and drive him to Pittsburgh, according to court papers.

Teeter is charged with aggravated assault, terroristic threats and related offenses. He was being held on $250,000 bail at the Westmoreland County Prison. He did not have an attorney listed in online court records. A Jan. 19 preliminary hearing is set.

Teeter was sentenced in 2019 to three months of house arrest and two years probation on a risking catastrophe charge. He set a pair of sweatpants on fire inside a St. Clair Manor apartment in January 2018, according to prosecutors.