A Wissinoming teen was wounded by a gunman who shot at her several times outside her grandmother’s home on the 5900 block of Cottage Street late Oct. 1. She was wounded in an arm and taken to St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children.
The seemingly pointless attack left a trail of blood on three properties and one neighbor with several bullet holes in his front door.
Police quickly chased down the 17-year-old’s assailant and put him under arrest. Dwayne Darden, 38, of the 4300 block of Benner Street is charged with attempted murder, assault, theft, robbery and weapons offenses.
Neighbors and the girl’s grandmother, who asked not to be named, said the gunman was a stranger to them and they have no idea what provoked him to shoot the teen.
According to the victim’s grandmother, the teen was sitting on the front porch, talking on her phone shortly before 11 p.m. on Oct. 1 when a friend came up to the porch to talk to her. Soon after, the stranger walked up and began repeatedly asking the teen’s friend if the bike was his. Her granddaughter’s friend answered the man that the bike was his, but the stranger repeated the question several times. The man showed his gun and the victim’s friend told him to take the bike.
“He was high,” the grandmother said of the man. She said her granddaughter’s friend ran into the house after the man showed a gun. One neighbor said it was obvious the man was on drugs because he tried to ride the bike, but fell off.
Meanwhile, two neighbors were returning home after 11 p.m. after picking up some food and saw the man guiding the teenage girl down the front steps.
One neighbor, who was hosing the girl’s blood off his porch steps on Oct. 2, said he and his mother could see the tall, thin man in his mid-30s was holding something to the girl’s back. As they got closer to their own home, they heard the man asking the girl who they were. After the neighbors went inside their home, they heard shots and then someone pounding on their front door.
They had no idea who was there — the girl or the man — but then bullets came through the door, the neighbor said.
Inside her home, the victim’s grandmother said she thought, “Oh,no, they killed her!”
A bullet struck one of the girl’s arms and she struggled across another neighbor’s porch to get back inside her house as the man kept firing at her.
While all of this was happening, neighbors were calling 911.
“The cops were here fast,” one said. “There were a lot of cars.” Another said a police helicopter was above the street in no time.
One neighbor said the fleeing man tossed his gun into the street, where officers soon found it. According to police, officers caught up to the man a few blocks away, at Jackson and Higbee streets. Witnesses identified him when he was brought back to Cottage Street.
The block is normally quiet, one neighbor said. “We don’t have this happening around here.”
Darden has a lengthy criminal record. He pleaded guilty to drug charges in 1995, 1996 and 2003. He was found guilty of drug charges in 2002. He was found guilty of weapons offenses in 2005 and pleaded guilty to weapons charges later that same year. He was arrested on drug charges in July. ••
