Prosecutors seeking death penalty against Ronald Steave in Homewood triple homicide

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) - Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against a man accused of killing two women and a boy in Homewood on New Year's Eve. 

Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen Zappala notified the court that he'll seek the death penalty against Ronald Steave, his office announced Thursday. 

Steave was charged with the deaths of his ex-girlfriend Nandi Fitzgerald, Tatiana "Tay" Hill and Fitzgerald's son, 16-year-old Denzel "Buddy" Nowlin. 

Zappala cited several aggravating circumstances in the shooting, including that a victim was a prosecution witness killed "for the purpose of preventing his testimony against the defendant" and Steave's "significant history" of violent felony convictions.   

Pittsburgh police were initially called to the 7500 block of Hamilton Avenue around 4 a.m. on Dec. 31 for reports of shots fired. Officers found a woman who had been shot in the head. The two other victims were found in a home.

In text messages retrieved by investigators, Fitzgerald criticized Steave for not paying child support or visiting their shared son, and she threatened to go to police about homicides she said Steave committed.

Steave was arrested on criminal homicide charges in 2015 in the death of a 19-year-old man in Homewood. Though those charges were later dropped for lack of evidence, police sources confirmed to KDKA in March that they suspected him in connection with at least three other fatal shootings.

They also have been looking to speak with him about the death of his 4-year-old son Ajani Lane who shot and killed himself on Nov. 22 on Negley Avenue in Pittsburgh. Steave had been living there at the time, and according to the affidavit, police found two guns in his upstairs bedroom.