Woman charged with firing gun in casino garage
Incident occurred early on Jan. 1
A Lower Burrell woman has been charged with firing a handgun and related crimes stemming from an incident early New Year’s Day on the ninth level of the Rivers Casino parking garage.
Julie Ann Renaldi, 37, was charged Saturday by state police with discharging a firearm into an occupied structure and carrying a firearm without a license, both felonies, as well as five counts of reckless endangerment, all misdemeanors, and a single count of disorderly conduct, a summary charge.
State Trooper Edward Hermick, assigned to the department’s Gaming Enforcement Unit at Rivers Casino, reported in an affidavit of probable cause that the following occurred:
At 9:42 p.m. on New Year’s Eve, a surveillance camera captured Ms. Renaldi parking a black Kia Sorento on Level 9 of the casino parking garage. She and a male passenger, later identified as her boyfriend, got out of the vehicle and went to the casino where they later argued and separated.
At about 2:03 a.m. on New Year’s Day, the boyfriend and another man returned to the parked vehicle with Ms. Renaldi following shortly behind with two other men. Ms. Renaldi and her boyfriend opened the driver’s and passenger doors, respectively, and leaned into the vehicle. Both stood up outside the vehicle, and at 2:06 a.m. a flash and smoke were seen near the driver’s side, indicative of a gunshot being fired toward the ceiling of the garage. The other men left the garage and returned to the casino. Ms. Renaldi and her boyfriend exchanged words, got into the vehicle and left casino property.
Ms. Renaldi was identified by using the vehicle’s registration plate, casino player’s card use, driver’s license photo and surveillance video, Trooper Hermick reported.
On Wednesday, a bullet fragment was recovered from the floor of Level 9 of the parking garage near where Ms. Renaldi’s vehicle had been parked, Later that day, Ms. Renaldi told Trooper Hermick that her boyfriend had been taking his gun out of the glove box and she grabbed it out of his hand and when she exited the vehicle it discharged. She said she did not know the gun was loaded nor how it went off. Ms. Renaldi admitted she was intoxicated when the gun was discharged.
At the time the gun was fired, the garage level was occupied by the other men who had been with the couple, other casino customers and vehicular traffic, Trooper Hermick reported.