() — An 84-year-old white homeowner accused of shooting Ralph Yarl after the black teen went to the wrong Kansas City address to pick up his siblings, told police they did not exchange words before he told her. shot through a locked glass door, and that he did so because he thought the teen was trying to get in.
The homeowner, Andrew Lester — who faces two felony counts of first-degree assault and armed felony action — told police he fired shots immediately after answering the doorbell when he saw 16-year-old Ralph, pulling on an exterior door handle, according to the probable cause document obtained by .
Lester said he was “scared to death” because of the boy’s size, according to the document.
After the April 13 shooting, which left the teen with gunshot wounds to the head and arm, Ralph told police while hospitalized that he didn’t pull on the door, according to the document.
Ralph was released from the hospital as “nothing short of a miracle,” but “he’s not out of the woods yet,” his attorney Ben Crump told on Monday.
The shooting of the unarmed black teenager captured national attention, sparking outrage online and fueling protests in Kansas City. Protesters have marched through the city chanting “Justice for Ralph” and calling for the shooter’s arrest.
Clay County District Attorney Zachary Thompson said “there was a racial component to this case,” but did not elaborate.
Lester was not in custody as of Monday night, although an arrest warrant was issued for him, according to authorities.
The night of the shooting, the 84-year-old man was taken into custody but was released less than two hours later, two representatives from the Kansas City Police Department’s detention unit previously told . Thompson said Lester was released because police recognized that more investigative work needed to be done.
Andrew Lester was accused of shooting 16-year-old Ralph Yarl.
Attorney Crump told ‘s Jake Tapper on Monday that it doesn’t make sense that the shooter hasn’t been arrested.
“No one can tell us that if the tables were reversed and a black man shot a 16-year-old white boy simply for ringing the doorbell, he wouldn’t be arrested,” Crump said. “I mean, this citizen went home and slept in his bed at night after shooting that young black man in the head.”
“He just rang the bell. That was it,” Crump said. “And the owner of the house shoots through the door, hitting him in the head and then he shoots him a second time.”
was unable to reach the home’s owner for comment. A lawyer was not listed on his previous booking report.
How the shooting unfolded
The night of the shooting, Lester was lying in bed when he heard the doorbell ring and reached for his .32 caliber revolver, Lester told police, according to a probable cause statement.
He then proceeded to the front entrance of his home, which includes an inner door and an outer glass door, both of which are locked.
Lester opened the inner door and “saw a black male approximately six feet tall pulling the handle on the outer storm door,” Lester told police.
“Lester stated that he believed someone was trying to enter the home and fired two shots within seconds of opening the door,” the probable cause statement reads.
“He believed that he was protecting himself from a physical confrontation and could not risk the male entering,” the document reads.
Lester said he immediately called 911 after the shooting, according to the document.
A police officer walks past the house where 16-year-old Ralph Yarl was shot on Monday.
Police spoke to Ralph while he was being treated at a hospital, where he told them that his mother asked him to pick up his siblings at 1100 NE 115th Street, according to the document, which lists the actual address where they were staying. it was 1100 NE 115th Terrace.
When he arrived at the 115th Street home, Ralph said he rang the bell and waited for a while before a man answered the door and immediately shot him in the head, causing him to fall, the document says.
While the teen was still on the ground, the man shot him again in the arm, Ralph told police.
Ralph said he got up and ran to avoid being shot, and heard the man say, “Don’t come this way,” the document says. He then went to several nearby houses asking for help and telling people to call the Police.
The boy told police that he had not pulled the door, according to the probable cause statement.
Officers went to the scene shortly before 10 p.m. after receiving reports of a shooting. When they arrived, they found the wounded boy in the street.
Responding officers also found the glass on the storm door of Lester’s home broken, with blood on the front porch and in the driveway, according to the probable cause document.
A neighbor, who asked not to be identified, told that she called 911 after Ralph came to her door, bleeding.
Since the shooter’s location was unknown at the time, the emergency operator told him to stay inside his home for his safety. She said that she complied initially, and then came out with towels to help suppress the bleeding.
“It’s someone’s child. I had to clean the blood off the door and the railing. It was the blood of someone’s child. I’m a mother… this is not right,” she said.
“You can’t make a profile and shoot our children”
Crump said Ralph is still struggling with the trauma of the ordeal, but the family is hoping for a full recovery because Ralph is young and strong.
“He and his family are glad he’s alive after being shot in the head,” Crump told .
Ralph, a section leader in a marching band who could often be found with an instrument in hand, had been looking forward to graduating high school and visiting West Africa before starting college, according to a GoFundMe started by the Ralph’s aunt, Faith Spoonmore.
“Life is very different now. Although she is fine physically, she has a long road ahead of her mentally and emotionally. The trauma she has to endure and survive is unimaginable,” the aunt wrote at the fundraiser.
The page GoFundMecreated to help the family with medical expenses, had raised more than $2 million in donations as of Monday night.
Crump compared Ralph’s shooting to those of Trayvon Martin, 17, in Florida, and Ahmaud Arbery, 25, in Georgia, two unarmed black Americans who were fatally shot by assailants who later claimed self-defense.
“We’re still fighting to say you can’t profile and shoot our kids just because you have this ‘stand your ground’ law,” Crump said. “It is unacceptable”.
Stand your ground laws allow people to respond to threats or force without fear of criminal prosecution anywhere a person has a right to be. It is not yet clear if this will play a role in Lester’s case.
Lee Merritt, another attorney representing Ralph and his family, told on Monday that the “stand your ground” action would not apply to Ralph’s case.
“The ‘stand your ground’ actions, under Missouri law, are completely inapplicable to this case, because there has been no discussion, either by the suspect, the victim or law enforcement, that Ralph Yarl, through his 16 years, ever posed a threat to this shooter,” Merritt said.
‘s Joe Sutton contributed to this report.
