Police: Dispute over Car Trade Leads to Gunshots, Arrests

A car trade that went bad resulted in gunfire and two arrests Monday night on Eight Mile Road near Pinecrest, Ferndale police said today.

Ferndale Police officers responded at about 9:15 p.m. to a fight in progress on the 1300 block of Bertha, Ferndale Detective Lt. William Wilson said. Moments before they arrived, a 911 caller reported that shots had been fired and that the suspects were fleeing toward Eight Mile Road, he said.

"One officer arrived on the scene and found a 50-year-old male resident of Bertha holding a metal pipe and standing in the street in front of his house," Wilson said.

The other officers continued toward Eight Mile and found two men in the median of the road, near Pinecrest, where they were arrested, Wilson said.

The men were brothers, Wilson said. One was released, while the other is waiting arraignment, Wilson said.

"One of them men had a gun that was recently fired and he said that he shot in self-defense after the resident on Bertha shot at him with a shotgun," Wilson said.

"The incident was a result of a car trade that went bad," Wilson said.

According to Wilson, the resident on Bertha and a teenage brother of the men who were arrested had traded cars Sunday. The teen wanted to undo the car trade with the Bertha resident, Wilson said. There was a disagreement between the parties about undoing the trade, Wilson said, so the 17-year-old and his friend drove the car in question to Bertha, followed in another vehicle by the mother and his  brothers.

Wilson said that as the cars pulled up, the man came out of his house yelling and the altercation continued down the street. During the argument, two rounds were fired at the man but missed, Wilson said.

The people who drove to Bertha fled on foot except the mother, who drove off in her vehicle, he said.

The man is to be arraigned on felony charges of assault with a dangerous weapon, Wilson said. No one was hurt in the incident.

Come back to Ferndale Patch for more details on this story as they become available.