He died from pneumonia 17 years after being shot. Now it's a homicide case.
The December death of a man who was shot more than 17 years ago in North Braddock has been ruled a homicide.
William Loughner had been drinking iced tea at Crud’s Bar on Brinton Avenue on June 27, 2008, when a pair of masked gunman stormed in and demanded money, according to his widow, Dawn Loughner.
When Loughner and others tried to force the men out the front door, the shooters unleashed a spray of bullets, Dawn Loughner said.
Her husband was shot in the head and arm. Two others were wounded. The attackers were never caught or even identified.
Loughner developed disabilities that eventually left him using a wheelchair, largely unable to speak and requiring the use of a feeding tube.
Loughner died on Christmas Eve at UPMC East hospital after contracting pneumonia, the Allegheny County Medical Examiner’s Office said Thursday. The office ruled his death a homicide. His widow said authorities linked her husband’s death to consequences from the 2008 shooting.
Loughner was 61.
Allegheny County Police have reopened the case, spokesman Jim Madalinsky told TribLive Thursday. Detectives have been assigned to again seek the two shooters.
“I’m hoping, now that I have a homicide ruling, maybe it will lead to something,” Dawn Loughner, 58, of North Braddock, told TribLive. “(The shooters) could be in jail. They could be dead. But, even if they’re in jail, they should be held accountable for what they did — because somebody died.”
Dawn Loughner said she quit her waitressing job shortly after the shooting to care full-time for her husband, who she married in 1994.
The couple raised a daughter, now an adult, and Loughner had two children from a previous relationship, his widow said. The family survived thanks to Loughner’s disability payments and grants from a victims’ group.
Dawn Loughner said Thursday she wasn’t sure how much her husband wanted to see the shooters arrested.
“He didn’t really want to talk about that too much,” she told TribLive. “But those guys, they got away with nothing because of my husband and his buddy. They got nothing.”
Justin Vellucci is a TribLive reporter covering crime and public safety in Pittsburgh and Allegheny County. A longtime freelance journalist and former reporter for the Asbury Park (N.J.) Press, he worked as a general assignment reporter at the Trib from 2006 to 2009 and returned in 2022. He can be reached at jvellucci@triblive.com.
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