{"id":6920,"date":"2025-10-18T09:26:06","date_gmt":"2025-10-18T09:26:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/6920\/"},"modified":"2025-10-18T09:26:06","modified_gmt":"2025-10-18T09:26:06","slug":"newspaper-from-1962-recounts-shooting-involving-erie-city-council-president","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/6920\/","title":{"rendered":"Newspaper from 1962 recounts shooting involving Erie City Council president"},"content":{"rendered":"

(WJET\/WFXP<\/a>) \u2013 An anecdotal story meant to sympathize with grieving citizens has spiraled into a bit of controversy for one council member. <\/p>\n

At an Erie City Council Meeting on Wednesday, July 16, President Mel Witherspoon told a shocking story about a shooting he was involved in when he was a teenager to a large group of protestors speaking out about the death of Marchello Woodard<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\t
\n\t\tErie City Co. president claims to have shot man in the head\t<\/a><\/p>\n

Now, reporters at JET 24 received the newspaper article written over 60 years ago regarding the incident. <\/p>\n

Nebraska newspaper Scottsbluff Star-Herald published an article on the front page of their August 29, 1962, issue titled \u201cCollege Youth Suffers Shot Wound in Dormitory Hotel.\u201d <\/p>\n

In the article, a 17-year-old Mel Witherspoon is involved in a shooting with another teenager at a hotel. <\/p>\n

While Witherspoon simply said he shot a man in the head, the article goes into much more detail, stating, \u201cThe bullet entered the face at the left cheekbone, crossed behind the nose passage, and lodged behind the right cheekbone. It was thought that it did not strike any area of the brain, and the youth was able to talk to both doctors and investigating officers.\u201d <\/p>\n

Much like Witherspoon\u2019s recount at Wednesday\u2019s meeting, the article also mentioned his singular night in jail, this time with added details about the incident, such as how two young children found the gun outside of the hotel following the incident, along with where the gun was purchased. <\/p>\n

The biggest difference between the two tales is how exactly the shooting transpired. <\/p>\n

At Wednesday night\u2019s meeting, Witherspoon spoke as if the shooting was intentional. <\/p>\n

\u201cI said, \u2018You know, Nick, I can blow your head off.\u2019 He said, \u2018Go ahead.\u2019 And I did. I shot him in the head point-blank. This close,\u201d said Witherspoon.<\/p>\n

\t
\n\t\tCommunity demands answers for Marchello Woodard at Erie City Council meeting\t<\/a><\/p>\n

The article, however, claims that the incident was an accident. <\/p>\n

\u201cSheriff Steve Warrick, before midnight, obtained a witnessed statement from Deligianis saying there was no trouble between the youths and they had simply been \u2018playing with the guns\u2019 when the one discharged,\u201d the article states.<\/p>\n

Following Wednesday night\u2019s meeting, Witherspoon has declined to make a comment. <\/p>\n

Those interested in reading the full article, provided by the Star-Herald<\/a>, can do so below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(WJET\/WFXP) \u2013 An anecdotal story meant to sympathize with grieving citizens has spiraled into a bit of controversy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6921,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[136,5241,138,137,2295,182,4636,4896,6183,220],"class_list":["post-6920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-erie","tag-erie","tag-erie-city-council","tag-erie-headlines","tag-erie-news","tag-jet-24","tag-local-news","tag-marchello-woodard","tag-mel-witherspoon","tag-scottsbluff-star-herald","tag-shooting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6920","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=6920"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6920\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}