PITTSBURGH — A man is accused of using a slingshot to hurl rocks at people in Downtown Pittsburgh.
“He would just sit there looking at people and shooting at ‘em… he’s crazy,” Brian Michael told Channel 11.
Michael was there yesterday morning, when police say Yashua Strong was shooting rocks at people, with a slingshot, in Mellon Square Park.
“They didn’t know what was going on; it was coming from nowhere,” he added.
According to Pittsburgh police, they got multiple reports of Strong hurling the rocks at people around 9 a.m. Sunday.
“It’s terrible, this is a nice park up here. There’s pigeons, fountains, people hang up there to eat lunch,” Michael said.
One victim told investigators he was hit with rocks multiple times in the back of his legs, and that the suspect then acted like he had a gun in his waistband, and told the victim, “I’m going to deal with you.”
Another victim was a city employee who was painting the fountain in the middle of the park. Police say Strong fired a rock at his face and broke his sunglasses.
People who were downtown today were surprised to hear this happened in the middle of busy Mellon Square Park.
Police say the man is homeless and was already issued a citation 30 minutes earlier.
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