Several people were smoking marijuana and drinking tequila early Monday in a Wilkins apartment when a pistol one of them was waving around went off, fatally striking a 17-year-old girl in the head, according to investigators.
Police arrested Rayohna Hexstall, 20, and charged her with involuntary manslaughter, a misdemeanor, in the death of Ni’Dreyah Marshall of Wilkins, a student at Woodland Hills High School.
Hexstall had been drinking Espolon tequila with three people in Ni’Dreyah’s home in the 1100 block of Penn Center Boulevard before Hexstall started “to play” with the gun around 3:15 a.m., a criminal complaint said.
A witness told police Hexstall’s finger was on the trigger as she waved it, and the pistol went off, killing Ni’Dreyah as the teen sat on her bed.
Police said at the time of the shooting, Hexstall’s 1-year-old daughter was in a car seat by the apartment’s front door.
Hexstall initially told Wilkins police that another person in the apartment shot the teen, the complaint said. Two people at the scene, however, told investigators that Hexstall was playing with the gun when the shot was fired, according to the complaint.
Police did not say why Hexstall was in the apartment or what her relationship was to the victim. Ni’Dreyah’s mother told police she was out of town at the time of the shooting.
Leeth Council, Jr., who police said owns the gun that killed Marshall, told authorities he came to Apartment 306 in Brentmoor Apartments in Wilkins’ Penn Center development around 9 p.m. Sunday, the complaint said.
Council said he had met Hexstall on Snapchat and she invited him to the two-bedroom apartment, the complaint said. Hexstall brought her child.
At some point that night, Council told police, he removed his pistol from his waistband “because it was rubbing on his skin,” the complaint said.
When Council pulled out the gun, he told police Hexstall “appeared interested” in it, the complaint said. He removed the gun’s magazine and “showed her the basics of the gun.” Hexstall snapped cellphone photos of herself with the weapon, police said.
Council told investigators he took his gun back at some point and replaced the magazine, which holds the bullets, but did not “manipulate the slide to put one in the chamber at that time,” the complaint said.
Council put the gun on a couch outside the teen’s bedroom, according to the complaint. Later that night, around 3 a.m., Hexstall picked up the gun and walked into Ni’Dreyah’s room, police said.
Council followed her and watched Hexstall waving the gun around at the end of the bed, according to the affidavit.
Hexstall did that “for a few minutes,” the complaint said. She pointed it at a person police identified as Malachi Brown, who told police he felt uncomfortable because he saw Hexstall’s finger on the trigger.
Brown told police he got up from the teen’s bed, where he was sitting, because he was “in fear of being shot,” the complaint said. After he stood up, the gun went off.
Brown told police Hexstall “looked surprised” when the gun fired, the complaint said.
Police said Brown ran out of the apartment and Council left the room. Both men called 911.
Hexstall waited with the two men in the apartment’s lobby until officers arrived, the complaint said.
A paramedic pronounced Ni’Dreyah dead at the scene.
Allegheny County Police, who were brought in to investigate, charged Hexstall with involuntary manslaughter and recklessly endangering another person.
She was taken to the Allegheny County Jail and arraigned Tuesday morning, court records show. A judge denied bail.
Hexstall’s attorney was not listed Tuesday in court records. Her preliminary hearing is set for March 6.
Wilkins police did not return a phone call or email Tuesday seeking comment.
