A North Baltimore man is facing 17 charges after he allegedly shot and killed two of his neighbors over a parking-space dispute, police said, according to the Baltimore Sun.
Charges against Dennis Padgett, 34, include first-degree murder, assault and possessing a firearm with a felony conviction. He is currently being held at the Baltimore City Detention Center, the news site notes.
According to investigators, the enraged Padgett shot 40-year-old Troy R. Preston four times in the head outside his home before chasing down Robert Durham Thomas, 47, gunning him down in the middle of traffic on Northern Parkway on Friday afternoon.
The argument begun around 3:45 p.m. as Padget and Thomas began fighting over the parking space outside Padgett’s house. The 34-year-old reportedly took his children inside the house before coming back outside with an AR-15-type assault rifle and a 9 mm handgun, the Baltimore Sun notes, and began shooting.
The incident took place near two schools, Leith Walk Elementary and Mercy High School. The elementary school, however, had already dismissed its students for the day, and because of exams, most of the high school students had also left campus.
The Sun reports that this is not the first time Padgett has had a violent run-in with the law. In 2009 he was found guilty of second-degree assault, and in 2004 he was charged with attempted first-degree murder, although he ended up being convicted of first-degree assault in that case.
Read more at the Baltimore Sun.