Man arrested for firing ‘warning shot’ in Youngstown city limits
A 22-year-old Youngstown man was arrested Friday morning after bringing a gun into an argument and firing a “warning shot” in the air, according to Youngstown police reports.
Several YPD officers were called to Parkwood Avenue shortly after 9 a.m. on Friday.
They were headed to Parkwood Avenue to help break up a fight between two men at a residence and knew from the caller that one of the individuals in the fight had a gun.
While driving to the address, police officers reported hearing a single gunshot.
Reports say officers heard the gun go off when they crossed the intersection of Lakewood Avenue and Edwards Street heading toward the house on Parkwood Avenue.
When police turned on Parkwood Avenue, they could see a man running through several yards on the block toward Falls Avenue.
Reports said the officers quickly searched the area and were able to find the suspect, who’d later be identified as 22-year-old Ta’Quan Williams from Youngstown.
Williams was found by police hiding behind an abandoned car parked in the backyard of a house on Fall Avenue.
Williams was placed in the back of a YPD cruiser so some of the officers ask him questions, while others went back to the home on Parkwood Avenue where the call first came in, according to police.
Reports said police asked Williams if he had any weapons; Williams answered he had a gun, but “it had fallen out of his pocket while he was running.”
Verbal altercation escalated
Several witnesses told police Williams instigated verbal and physical altercations at the house.
Police talked to the first victim who told police he was inside when Williams entered the house downstairs.
According to the male victim, Williams came inside with another woman; reports say she’s related to the other female witness, who owns the house.
A verbal altercation started between the two as they came in the house, according to reports.
The male victim who was on the “second floor of the home looking down the stairwell” then “saw Williams holding a black handgun,” according to reports.
The police reports say during the verbal fight, the female victim locked Williams out of the house and he started kicking the outside of the door.
The 51-year-old male victim was able to see Williams outside; this witness went outside and started to fight with Williams on the porch and the yard to get him away from the house, according to reports.
During the fist fight, Williams “struck [the victim] with his first in the head two to three times.” Eventually the male victim was “able to get back up and move away from [Williams],” according to police reports.
After the two separated, Williams “ran to the street where he held the gun in the air and fired one round,” according to the male victim’s statement to police.
The male victim told police he didn’t think Williams was trying to shoot or hurt anyone, but it was a “warning shot.”
The two female witnesses confirmed with police that it was “a verbal altercation that escalated,” according to YPD reports.
While one YPD officer talked to the witnesses and confirmed the man they arrested on Falls Avenue was Williams, two others were able to find the suspect’s gun, reports indicated.
Reports say a black semi-automatic Zigana PX-9 pistol was found by officers.
It’d been “tucked into a crevasse near a tree in the backyard” of the house on Parkwood Avenue where the fight happened.
Police weren’t able to find any shell casings, reports said.
Williams was taken to the Mahoning County Jail and faces charges for assault and discharging a firearm in Youngstown city limits.
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