Prosecutors charged a Jefferson County man Tuesday in connection with last week’s shooting of a 17-year-old who was looking for a place to take homecoming pictures.
Brent Metz, a 38-year-old Mountain View Town Council member, was charged with second-degree assault, illegal discharge of a firearm and two counts of menacing — all felonies — during a morning hearing, according to court records.
On Sept. 10, Jefferson County sheriff’s deputies responded to a homeowner who reported two trespassers on her property, according to a news release from the Office of the First Judicial District Attorney..
The woman, who co-owns the home with Metz, called 911 after a security camera recorded the teens walking around the property, judicial officials said. She was not home at the time.
When deputies arrived, they found a 17-year-old who had been shot in the face and an apparent bullet hole in the windshield of the teenager’s car, investigators said.
The 17-year-old, who has not been publicly identified, told sheriff’s deputies that he and a 15-year-old friend were driving around Deer Creek Canyon after school to look for a place to take photos ahead of Dakota Ridge High School’s homecoming celebration over the weekend.
The teens saw the Pleasant Park Road property, which featured a lake and a dock, and decided to ask permission to come back for their picture session, according to a Jefferson County arrest affidavit.
When no one answered the door and the teens couldn’t find a property owner, they returned to their car — which was parked off of the property — and began writing a note asking the homeowner for their permission, investigators said.
As they were writing the note, Metz drove up on the passenger side of the victim’s vehicle, blocking it from leaving, the affidavit said. Metz got out with a gun and “a shot went off,” prosecutors said in a news release, breaking through the windshield of the vehicle and striking the 17-year-old driver in the face.
The teens told investigators that Metz said, “Oh (expletive), my gun went off,” and that the man attempted to render medical aid, judicial officials said.
“There is no evidence to support that Metz acted with extreme indifference,” judicial officials said in the release. The lack of extreme indifference caused prosecutors to file a second-degree assault charge instead of first-degree assault.
