OAK GROVE, Mo. (AP) — An 18-year-old has been charged with fatally shooting another driver along a busy Missouri highway in what police say was a road-rage incident.
The Southeast Missourian reports that Charles Smith Jr. of Cape Girardeau was arrested after a search that followed a deadly shooting Wednesday on Interstate 70 near an exit to Oak Grove, a town located near the eastern edge of the Kansas City metropolitan area.
Smith is charged with second-degree murder and other felonies in the death of 53-year-old Gary Denham of Oak Grove. No attorney is listed for him in online court records.
Denham was found shot inside a pickup truck that veered off the side of the interstate, eventually hitting a parked vehicle at a gas station. According to a probable cause statement, State Highway Patrol and Oak Grove Police Department were notified of a road-rage incident involving two cars on the eastbound lane of the interstate.
During questioning, Smith said that the truck’s driver was making obscene gestures, cut Smith off, and hit his car multiple times. Smith said that he fired a “warning shot” at the tuck and didn’t know he hit anyone, the probable cause statement said. Smith was ultimately taken into custody about 40 miles (64 kilometers) away in Sweet Springs.