An angry teenager fired a blank shot at a man driving along Interstate 95 Monday night and not even the victim’s 2-year-old daughter being in the car stopped the rage, said Pennsylvania State Police.
State police put out a bulletin after the incident around 9 p.m. Monday along the southbound lanes of I-95 near Exit 40 in Bristol Township, Bucks County.
Philadelphia police later spotted a suspect matching the description of 18-year-old William Henderson of Philadelphia driving a silver 1999 Mercury Grand Marquis believed to be used in the incident in Northeast Philadelphia, state police said in a affidavit of probable cause.
It turned out that the gun state police said Henderson used in the road rage incident was actually a starter pistol with blank rounds.
Henderson told police that he fired the pistol at the 30-year-old man's car because he believed the man had cut him off.
The Northeast Philadelphia man told police he accidentally cut off Henderson's car while merging onto I-95 south from Route 413. Henderson then pulled up beside the man's car and fired a single shot out of the passenger window, according to the affidavit.
"He said that he immediately slowed down because he thought that he had been shot," reads the affidavit.
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The 30-year-old driver and his young daughter weren’t hurt, said police.
A judge arraigned Henderson overnight on reckless endangerment, simple assault, harassment and weapons charges and sent Henderson to county jail after the teen was unable to post 10 percent of $10,000 bail, according to court records.