Police: Security cameras captured double homicide outside strip club

Security cameras outside of a McKees Rocks strip club captured the shooting early Friday morning that left two men dead and three other people injured, according to court records.

The shooting happened just after 2:30 a.m. in the parking lot of Club Erotica on Island Avenue, and Allegheny County Police have said the gunfire stemmed from an altercation between two groups of people.

Christopher Roy Butler, 22, of West Mifflin, and Seth Andrew McDermit, 31, of Monongahela, were pronounced dead at the scene around 3 a.m.

Two other men – Charles Becher, 24, and Khalil Walls, 25 – both face homicide charges in connection with the shooting.

Becher told investigators he opened fire in self-defense, according to the criminal complaint filed against him. He said he’d been at the club with several of his cousins and friends, and someone at one point came inside and said “someone was outside getting jumped” and his cousins were involved.

Becher said he went outside and found a group of men threatening his cousins, according to the complaint. He said one man flashed a gun, at which point Becher pulled out his firearm as well. He said several men attacked him, knocking him to the ground and beating him, police wrote.

According to the complaint, Becher said he heard gunshots and, fearing for his life, began shooting.

A man who was with McDermit and Butler, however, told a different story, according to police.

The witness told investigators he’d been at the club with five people, including McDermit and Butler. He told police the group went outside to the club’s parking lot to smoke, at which point a scuffle broke out among several of the men and some women who were also outside, according to the complaint.

A man who was with the women pulled out a gun, and McDermit tackled him, the witness told police, and then the shooting started.

Surveillance footage from the club captured the shooting.

Detectives said that at about 2:51 a.m. Friday, there was an altercation “amongst multiple individuals,” and the video shows Becher pulling a gun from his waistband and pointing it at McDermit and the witness.

Police on Friday initially said the shooting happened just after 2:30 a.m. It was not immediately clear what led to the discrepancy.

The video shows Becher striking the witness with the gun, and seconds later it shows another man, later identified as Walls, firing toward McDermit, Butler and the others, according to the complaint. Police said Becher is seen shooting McDermit, who then staggers out of the camera’s view.

Both men are scheduled for preliminary hearings Friday morning.

Allegheny County Health Department officials have noted that Club Erotica should not have been open, based on the state’s covid-19 mitigation measures, as it does not have a valid food permit. A spokesman said two complaints were filed in the latter half of last year, too.