ALLENTOWN, Pa. – Two men are dead, and two more are in custody after two separate shootings in the city of Allentown Monday night.<\/p>\n
Officials say while both happened in nearby neighborhoods — and within just more than an hour’s time of one another — they do not appear to be related.<\/p>\n
“We are frustrated whenever this type of violent activity occurs,” Mayor Matt Tuerk (D-Allentown) said.<\/p>\n
Not one, but two Allentown neighborhoods within 10 minutes of each other are reeling from deadly gun violence.<\/p>\n
“Resulting in the arrest of both shooters, they’re both in custody, both arraigned,” District Attorney Gavin Holihan (R-Lehigh County) said.<\/p>\n
Officials are still investigating, but say so far the two shootings do not appear to be related.<\/p>\n
The first happened just before seven p.m. Monday night on West Gordon Street.<\/p>\n
The Lehigh County Coroner says 59-year-old Allentown man, Mark Little, died from multiple gunshot wounds.<\/p>\n
Officers found 14 shell casings nearby.<\/p>\n
“It is unfortunate,” Holihan said, “it’s tragic when you see these types of incidents.”<\/p>\n
39-year-old Abdidahir Nieves was arrested after officials said 911 and other witnesses’ descriptions matched surveillance video, including what was described as a man seen near the shooting wearing a yellow ski mask.<\/p>\n
Police also found a 9-millimeter handgun with bullets matching those shell casings inside Nieves’ apartment.<\/p>\n
According to the affidavit, Nieves’ mother identified the male wearing the yellow mask as her son.<\/p>\n
Then, just more than an hour after that first shooting, officers found a second shooting victim around South Front and East Cumberland streets.<\/p>\n
41-year-old Jaroe Perry, from South Whitehall Township, also died. He was also found with multiple gunshot wounds.<\/p>\n
Following multiple witness accounts of a man — this time in all black — police arrested 44-year-old Barret Griggs.<\/p>\n
One witness placed the accused and the victim arguing inside a home ahead of the shooting. That witness said Griggs ran back inside, returned with a gun, and began firing at the victim, according to court papers.<\/p>\n
Court papers say officers went to speak with Griggs in his holding cell. According to the affidavit, Griggs said, “No ifs, ands or buts about it, I did it. I just want to know if he is alive.”<\/p>\n
Officials say they believe they have all suspects in custody and don’t believe there is danger to the public at this time.<\/p>\n
Both Mayor Tuerk and DA Holihan credit officials working together as well as involvement from the community to solve the crime.<\/p>\n
“Two in one night,” Holihan said. “These are families that have been impacted by the violence; it is gratifying in a small way, the cooperation that we get from the community.”<\/p>\n
“The best deterrent we have for criminal activity for those would-be criminals,” Tuerk said, “is to know that if you commit a crime in Allentown, we are going to catch you and make sure that you see justice.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALLENTOWN, Pa. – Two men are dead, and two more are in custody after two separate shootings in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":297748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[214,232,153,155,154,31,10466],"class_list":["post-297747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-_homepage_top_stories","tag-allentown-area","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-crime","tag-week-in-review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297747","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=297747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/297748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=297747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=297747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=297747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}