A man was arrested on charges he opened fire on a group in the parking lot of the Riverside Social Club after the bar closed Aug. 29.<\/p>\n
Tyrone A. Wright, 42, was taken into custody at a motel near the club with assistance from the Berks County Emergency Response Team\u2019s tactical unit as investigators served a search warrant at his room at the In Town Motel, 1635 Centre Ave., on Wednesday, Reading police said.<\/p>\n
Police confiscated a 9 mm pistol along with clothing and sneakers that matched what the shooter was seen wearing in security camera footage, investigators said.<\/p>\n
Wright, who listed the motel as his residence, was committed to Berks County Jail in lieu of $500,000 bail following his arraignment Wednesday night before District Judge Carissa L. Johnson in Reading Central Court.<\/p>\n
He faces three counts each of aggravated assault and recklessly endangering another person as well as single counts of possessing a firearm while prohibited and possessing an instrument of crime.<\/p>\n
The arrest came three days after another shooting near the same location that police said stemmed from a fight inside the Riverside club. In that incident, a man suffered a gunshot wound to the leg at about 2:30 a.m. Sunday, police said.<\/p>\n
The Riverside Volunteer Beneficial Association, also known as Riverside Social Club, is a private, nonprofit club.<\/p>\n
According to court records:<\/p>\n
Officers were dispatched about 3:15 a.m. Aug. 29 to the rear parking lot of 1742 Pear St., the location of the Riverside club.<\/p>\n
They found a pool of blood and 16 spent shell casings. A blood trail led from the parking lot to the 1900 block of Centre Avenue, where officers found a man who had been shot in the right knee. He was taken by ambulance to Reading Hospital.<\/p>\n
Officers then learned that two additional shooting victims had arrived at the hospital\u00a0 in private vehicles. An officer went to the hospital to interview all three victims.<\/p>\n
The victims gave similar accounts. They said they had been inside the club with friends and, after the bar closed at about 3 a.m., remained in the parking lot talking. They then heard at least a half-dozen shots. None knew who had fired the shots or from which direction they came.<\/p>\n
One victim told police he heard the gunfire and saw one of his friends fall before realizing he had been shot in the chest. He ran to his car while his friend got into the passenger seat, and they drove to the hospital.<\/p>\n
The victims told police they had not had any problems with anyone inside the club. They said a fight had occurred inside the bar about 20 minutes earlier, but they were not nearby.<\/p>\n
Investigators obtained surveillance footage that captured the shooter\u2019s movements before, during and after the shooting.<\/p>\n
The footage shows a man later identified as Wright walking east on Exeter Street from Pear Street, about a half-block from the club, shortly after 3 a.m. He proceeded to the rear of the motel wearing a black T-shirt pulled over his head. A white shirt underneath appeared to be covered in blood.<\/p>\n
Interior motel footage shows the man walking up a staircase to the second floor and falling into a wall when he reached the top.<\/p>\n
About 10 minutes later, motel footage shows him leaving the building via a rear fire escape. He heads west on Exeter Street. Additional surveillance footage shows the man walking to the Riverside club and, at about 3:16 a.m., opening fire. He then runs from the scene and follows the same route back to the motel.<\/p>\n
After his arrest, Wright was taken to City Hall, where he was interviewed by Criminal Investigator Joshua Sheller.<\/p>\n
Wright told Sheller that he had been \u201cjumped\u201d and assaulted at the club and was bleeding profusely from a head wound. He said he wrapped his head in a T-shirt and was too dizzy to drive, so he walked back to the motel.<\/p>\n
Sheller showed Wright still images of the shooter taken before and during the shooting. According to court records, Wright identified himself as the person shown in the images.<\/p>\n
Investigators also determined that Wright did not have a permit to carry a concealed firearm and was ineligible to obtain one because of a 2007 robbery conviction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A man was arrested on charges he opened fire on a group in the parking lot of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":288410,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[349,202,182,139,28,736,128,130,129,706],"class_list":["post-288409","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-berks-county","tag-crime-and-public-safety","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-pennsylvania","tag-reading","tag-reading-city","tag-reading-city-headlines","tag-reading-city-news","tag-top-stories-reg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288409","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288409"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288409\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}