Austintown residents voice concern over gunfire in neighbors' backyards

July 13, 2015 at 10:02p.m.

AUSTINTOWN

Township officials heard from a number of residents in the Wyndclift Circle area Monday night, worried about homeowners who fire high-powered guns in their backyards.

The bullets, however, are not staying in those homeowners’ backyards.

Steven Ruggles, 648 S. Wyndclift Circle, recalled coming home May 28, when his 8-year old daughter told him about a hole in the wall. He realized it was a bullet hole and it was determined it came from a high-powered rifle.

“The gunshot came through the back of my house where my deck is. Went through the shower of my bathroom. Went through two more interior walls and then went into the exterior wall in the front of my house. [It] must have hit the brick and went into the interior of the wall,” he recounted.

“As a father of 8-year old and 5-year old daughters, my kids still will not go into that bathroom without someone with them ... if someone had been in my bathroom when that thing went off, they’d be dead.”

Wyndclift Circle ison the west side of Austintown Township off of Fairview Road, which is off of Wilcox Road.

Austintown Police Chief Robert Gavalier further explained that the bullet that went through Ruggles’ home was at an upward angle, meaning it was shot from nearby. After Gavalier and Trustee Ken Carano discussed the Ohio Revised Code, and how it allows for a resident to fire a weapon in their backyard, officials decided to contact the Mahoning County Prosecutor’s office today to pursue regulations for a backstop that would absorb bullets.