KANSAS CITY, Mo. – A suburban Kansas City man was accused Saturday of opening fire on a couple in another car during a suspected road-rage confrontation, killing that driver and injuring his pregnant girlfriend as the couple were returning home from a sonogram appointment.
Jackson County prosecutors charged John Clarence Young Jr. of Independence, Missouri, with second-degree murder, illegal discharge of a weapon at or from a vehicle, and two counts of armed criminal action.
Prosecutors requested a $250,000 cash-only bond for Young, who is 45 and was arrested Friday. No online court records list an attorney for Young who could comment on the allegations, and Young does not have a listed home telephone number.
Authorities say the May 25 confrontation killed 19-year-old Christopher Hutson of Lee's Summit. Hutson's girlfriend, who is seven months pregnant, was grazed by a bullet. She was treated at a hospital and was released.
The girlfriend later told investigators that she and Hutson had just left a sonogram appointment when they became disoriented in rush-hour traffic, prompting Hutson to drive slowly as the couple tried to sort out their bearings on their phones, according to a probable-cause statement by Kansas City police Detective Donna Drake.
As the couple was stopped at an intersection, the woman told Drake, a driver of another car pulled up beside them and shouted before driving away. Hutson tailgated that car before pulling up next to it in hopes of exchanging words with the other driver, who opened fire, Drake wrote.
Hutson's girlfriend said her boyfriend was not armed.
After his arrest Friday, Drake wrote, Young "confirmed he had a self-defense story, but wished to tell it with his attorney present."
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