Text messages lead police to suspect

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

An 18-year-old charged with fatally shooting a McKeesport man texted a friend hours earlier that he wanted to kill someone, according to court records.

Allegheny County Police used the texts to link Elijah Price of Troy Hill to the Jan. 27 killing of Craig RhodesMitchell.

Mr. Price sent messages to an unnamed witness both before and after the killing at 1309 Centennial St., according to a criminal complaint. He was charged Tuesday.

The complaint said Mr. Price texted the witness at 10:17 a.m. — about 12 hours before the killing — and said he wanted to “catch a body,” according to the criminal complaint, prompting the witness to reply that “nothing good ever happens to people who catch bodies.”

Just before 8 p.m., Mr. Price texted the witness that he was “about to do some hot [stuff] tonight.”

Throughout the day, Mr. Price also texted Mr. Rhodes-Mitchell, according to the criminal complaint, who was known to deal marijuana from his apartment. They agreed to meet that night, and it appeared from the text messages that Mr. Price arrived at Mr. RhodesMitchell’s apartment about 9:50 p.m., according to the criminal complaint.

At 9:59 p.m., another tenant called 911 to report hearing a single gunshot followed by the sound of someone running down the apartment stairs. Mr. RhodesMitchell was shot in the head and pronounced dead at the scene at 10:13 p.m. Investigators found a bag of suspected marijuana in his microwave, as well as two pistols.

At 11:14 p.m., the witness who had texted Mr. Price earlier sent him another text that said, “I hope you didn’t tell nobody just me and you that is all?”

Mr. Price said he had not told anyone else. Four minutes later, he asked the witness to check Facebook to see if there was “anything about Craig.”

The witness later told officers that Mr. Price confessed to killing Mr. Rhodes-Mitchell that night and said Mr. Price came to the witness’s house and handed over a bag of cash and a “large package” of marijuana to keep safe for him, according to the complaint.

The bag of marijuana was “consistent” with a bag-sealing machine that was found in Mr. Rhodes-Mitchell’s apartment, according to the complaint.

Mr. Price is being held in the Allegheny County Jail and was denied bond.