Police: Shot fired over drug sale
Toolbox
By Gordon Dritschilo STAFF WRITER - Published: January 25, 2010
A Fair Haven man is charged with shooting into a Castleton apartment while trying to collect a $60 drug debt.
Casey A. Butler, 20, of West Street, pleaded innocent last week in Rutland District Court to a felony charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and misdemeanor charges of reckless endangerment and unlawful mischief.
Butler was ordered held for lack of $35,000 bail. If convicted, he could face a maximum of seven years in prison and $7,000 in fines.
Castleton police said Butler arrived at 54 Blissville Road Thursday night to collect $60 he said he was owed from the sale of 3 grams of marijuana. After kicking the door and hitting it with a cinder block, Butler told police he fired a gunshot through the door "to show he was serious," according to affidavits.
Neighbors had complained that Butler had also been there Wednesday, according to affidavits, declaring that he had a gun and was going to use it.
Police said the apartment's occupant — the roommate of Butler's alleged debtor — was asleep on his couch when Butler started pounding on the door and had gotten up to call the police when he heard the gunshot.
The bullet went through the door and through the arm of the couch before embedding itself in the back wall, police said. The roommate said he would have been hit had he still been on the couch, according to affidavits.
Police said they pulled Butler over on River Street in Castleton. A passenger in his car, 19-year-old John P. Muzzy, also of West Street in Fair Haven, had a 9mm magazine in his pocket containing ammunition like the round removed from the apartment's wall, according to affidavits.
Butler told police he had thrown the gun out the window of his car.
Muzzy was under conditions of release in previous cases that included simple assault on a police officer, disorderly conduct, unlawful mischief and drunken driving, according to court records, forbidding him to drink.
Police said they smelled intoxicants on Muzzy and demanded he take an alcohol test in accordance with his conditions of release, but that he refused.
Muzzy was arraigned alongside Butler on Friday, pleading innocent to a single misdemeanor charge of violating his conditions of release. He was held for lack of $3,500 bail.
gordon.dritschilo@rutlandherald.com
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