Teen faces 40 charges after firing pellet rifle at cars on busy NC highway, cops say
Two days after motorists reported being shot at as they drove on a major highway in Eastern North Carolina, police say they caught the culprit.
It’s a 14-year-old, according to media outlets.
Police in Bailey — 35 miles east of Raleigh — posted a warning to drivers in Wilson County late Wednesday of a suspected sniper taking shots at vehicles on 264 East between mile markers 38 and 40, the News & Observer reported.
Using “old-fashion legwork,” the Wilson County Sheriff’s Office on Friday charged a 14-year-old who lives in the area, WNCT reported.
The teenager, who was not named, faces 20 counts of discharging a barreled weapon into an occupied vehicle and an additional 20 counts of damage to personal property, according to ABC11, the Observer’s news partner.
“The Wilson County Sheriff’s Office was working on the case since the first report was made to us,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement, WRAL reported. “At no time was Highway 264 rendered unsafe due to constant patrols and covert surveillance in the area.”
All of the motorists were driving east on 264 when the shots were taken, deputies determined, according to the media outlet. They discovered a spent round in the area belonging to “a high-powered pellet rifle.”
Detectives also found “two make-shift ground blinds using natural shrubbery,” WNCT reported. The blinds were used to “conceal the shooter.”
No one was injured.
“Details of the investigation needed to be confidential so that evidence could not be destroyed and the person involved in these immoral acts could be located and arrested,” the sheriff’s office said in the statement, according to the media outlet.
This story was originally published January 17, 2020 at 6:12 PM with the headline "Teen faces 40 charges after firing pellet rifle at cars on busy NC highway, cops say."
