Man charged with homicide, accused of shooting and killing girlfriend's mother and wounding girlfriend in Ellwood City
ELLWOOD CITY, Pa. (KDKA) — One woman was killed and her daughter was injured in a shooting in Lawrence County on Monday evening.
The deadly shooting happened Monday just after 5 p.m. at an apartment on 1st Street in Ellwood City. According to the criminal complaint, police were called by the victim's other daughter, who was hiding in a closet in the apartment.
The mother, identified as 42-year-old Krista Knechtel, died at the scene while her daughter, Cassidy Smith, was taken to a hospital in Ohio in critical condition. Smith remains in a medically-induced coma.
Police say Smith's boyfriend shot the victims inside the third-floor apartment. Investigators charged 23-year-old Keegan Tyler Willis-King on Tuesday morning with criminal homicide and attempted criminal homicide.
According to the criminal complaint, officers said they heard four to five gunshots when they arrived at the scene Monday. When Willis-King came outside the apartment, according to the complaint, he was covered in blood and holding a gun.
A man inside a nearby bar, who did not want to be identified, saw police take the man into custody on Monday night.
"I saw the suspect backing down the street and then there were four or five cops, he went down on the ground," he said. "They handcuffed him and put him in the car. No shoes, socks, no t-shirt."
Officers entered the apartment and found Knechtel dead on the couch from a gunshot wound to the head, according to the charging documents. Smith was found on the floor near her mother with a gunshot wound to the head, but she was still breathing.
Investigators say Willis-King admitted to killing Knechtel, but he didn't remember what happened after smoking a marijuana dab he believed was laced with fentanyl.
The mayor said this is the first homicide of 2023.