Charleston police investigating fatal midday shooting near community park on peninsula (2024)

A worn red, green, blue and tan play structure sits in the center of a small community park at a public housing complex on Charleston’s peninsula. Just feet away, a pop-up tent shielded the body of a shooting victim from a crowd of nearby residents.

One adult male was shot to death in the middle of the day near a park at a public housing complex off East Bay Street. The victim, later identified as 25-year-old David Williams from Charleston, died at the scene just after 11 a.m. on June 10.

Charleston Police Department officers are still investigating the shooting, which took place between the green and yellow one-story homes of the Wragg Borough Homes public housing complex at 5 South St.

No one has been arrested as of the evening of June 10, but police believed there was no ongoing threat.

A large border of yellow crime scene tape was set up around the complex, blocking off South Street from America to Drake streets for a large portion of the afternoon. Dozens of residents gathered outside their apartments, sweating in the blistering summer heat.

Some onlookers complained about not being able to enter their apartments, which were blocked off by the active investigation. Others chatted calmly and stood facing the crime scene. Several kids ran through the grassy complex while playing with each other. A child’s discarded bike lay near the yellow tape.

This is the second fatal shooting Charleston police have investigated in 2024. Two people were shot at another public housing complex less than a mile north of the Wragg Borough Homes complex on May 7.

The victims were later identified as Derrick Rollerson Sr., 38, and Rashaad Simmons, 34. Police charged Altonio Lamont Prioleau, 37, with two counts of murder and one count of attempted murder.

It’s too early in the current investigation for police to publicly determine if the June 10 shooting is linked to other incidents, said Charleston Police Department spokesman Sgt. Christopher Stinson.

There have been about 30 homicides in the tri-county area so far in 2024, according to data The Post and Courier maintains. That’s roughly the same number of deaths recorded in the same time frame in 2023.

The Post and Courier tracked nearly 80 homicides in the greater Charleston area in 2023, which was down slightly from previous years.

One of those homicides was also recorded at the Wragg Borough Homes public housing complex. Bryant Powell, 51, died from a gunshot wound on Sept. 13.

Charleston police did not immediately respond to requests for more information about that shooting investigation.