Gunman fatally shot by Pittsburgh police after ‘hundreds of rounds’ fired near children’s hospital
August 23, 2023
The shooter has been identified as William Hardison
A gunman who fired “hundreds of rounds” near a Pittsburgh children’s hospital on Wednesday has been shot and killed following a wild standoff with police.
William “Bill” Hardison, 63, allegedly opened fire on Allegheny County Sheriff’s deputies when they arrived at his home in the Garfield neighborhood Wednesday morning to serve an eviction notice, according to CBS News.
Hardison was shot by police after hours of rounds being fired at the 4800 block of Broad Street and North Mathilda Street.
Officials confirmed Hardison was killed after the final gunfire exchange.
The gunman had barricaded himself in the house and had shot down two drones sent out by law enforcement. Rounds of gunfire could be heard throughout the day, with a third drone deployed to locate him in the home.
Pittsburgh police respond to an active shooting scene in the 4800 block of Broad Street in the Pittsburgh.
SWAT remove a person from a home on Broad Street.
Police
officers standby on Broad Street. Police are warning residents to stay
away from an active shooter situation near UPMC Children’s Hospital.
No officers were shot, as a result of the incident, but a deputy was injured in a fall.
Deputies were at the scene to evict Hardison, who was squatting at a home that belonged to his late brother, who died a few months ago.
Hardison allegedly claimed that he had a right to the house and refused to leave the dwelling even after it was sold off in a tax sale, Ed Krug, the attorney for the buyers told WPXI 11.
Krug also warned the sheriff’s office that an eviction could turn violent given “observations” made at the house, which is why half a dozen deputies were deployed.
Pittsburgh police respond to a shooting in the Pittsburgh neighborhood of Garfield on Wednesday, August 23rd 2023.
Pittsburgh SWAT team has taken over the scene, with officials describing it as an “extremely active situation with shots continuing to be fired.”
Chris Wilkinson, who witnessed the shooting, said officers had arrived on the block Wednesday morning and were banging on the door where the shooting first rang out.
“They were banging on it telling him they were there,” Wilkinson told CBS News. “And after a couple of minutes of them doing it, they started to kick down the door.
“Then they got a sledgehammer and took down the door, and after that shots started to be fired,” he added.
After the shooting began, multiple rounds were heard reverberating throughout the neighborhood, with neighbors describing the experience as surreal.
SWAT teams outside a home on Broad Street, Pittsburgh on Wednesday.
The suspect is believed to be barricaded in the block.
“I’ve never heard bullets like this,” one neighbor near the scene told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “Something you’d see in a movie.”
UPMC Children’s Hospital said the shooting is taking place about half a mile away, with the gunfire posing “no direct threat to patients, staff or visitors.”
The hospital, however, noted that it will be increasing security around its campus throughout the day.
Bystanders
watch as Pittsburgh police and other law enforcement personal respond
to gunfire in the Garfield neighborhood of Pittsburgh on Wednesday.
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