NEW BRIGHTON, Pa. — A Wampum man is in custody after police say he fired gunshots from his car in Beaver Falls and New Brighton on Wednesday afternoon in two busy areas, including the main street in Beaver Falls when students were being dismissed from school.
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Police identified the suspect as Benjamin Sanderbeck. Authorities said Sanderbeck fired a shot at a McDonald’s restaurant in Beaver Falls around 2:40 p.m. before shooting into a vehicle 5 minutes later on Fifth Avenue in New Brighton.
The first shot was fired around 2:40 p.m. along 7th Avenue, or Main Street, in Beaver Falls, where a bullet struck the letter “O” on the building sign of the McDonald’s restaurant.
Students from Beaver Falls schools had just been dismissed for the day when the gunshot was fired.
Channel 11 spoke Beaver Falls Mayor Kenya Johns around that same time Friday afternoon and saw dozens of students around the area.
“There was a lot of fear from our parents and our families and rightfully so,” Johns said. “You know as a mother myself, you know, all these kids are our future. They’re all my babies and things like that. So we did experience that That fear and that panic.”
Darain Lawson, who lives in Beaver Falls, voiced concern for children walking through the area.
“My daughters, my sons, they walk this, walk this school. It was just, you know, devastating for that to happen in this area of Beaver Falls,” Lawson said.
Minutes later, around 2:45 p.m., New Brighton police received a 911 call from a gas station on Fifth Avenue. A driver reported that his truck had been shot while driving near the intersection of Fifth Avenue, in front of a local credit union and the Fifth Avenue Taphouse.
Officers located a bullet hole in the rear driver’s side window and determined the round passed through the metal roof. Investigators recovered a bullet fragment stuck in the roof, as well as a bullet in the middle of Fifth Avenue with fabric matching the roof of the victim’s truck.
Police later tracked Sanderbeck to his home in Wampum and took him into custody. Investigators reported that Sanderbeck admitted to drinking and taking depression medication prior to the shootings.
He told officers he shot at the McDonald’s arches because “he did not want to hurt anyone” and did not realize he hit anything.
“I’m grateful that nobody got hurt,” Lawson said. “I’m a man of God and I’m grateful nobody got killed.”
“I never want our kids to feel like they have to prepare for that lifestyle, and I’ll never tell them prepare for that because they deserve a bright and promising future and tomorrow,” Johns added.
Sanderbeck is being held at the Beaver County Jail.
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