Jermell Burnett, who was arrested on suspicion of firing several shots at a home in the 1,000 block of Jefferson Street, will be arraigned Tuesday, according to a Boone County Jail spokesman.
Columbia Police Department spokeswoman Jill Wieneke said four people were in the home when Burnett began shooting. One of them, Burnett’s ex-girlfriend, had received a text message from him threatening to shoot her mother’s house if she did not tell him her location. Police found the message during the course of their investigation.
Four bullets hit the house, including two that shattered a window and the front door. Weineke said it is impossible to know how many shots were actually fired. No neighbors witnessed the shooting and no one was injured, a CPD news release stated.
Officers were dispatched just after 3 a.m. Feb. 17, after receiving a call from the residents inside the home. When they arrived, officers called the residents and instructed them to come outside.
“We called them back and said, ‘Hey, can you come out so we can make sure there’s no bad guys in the house?” Wieneke said.
After the residents were safely outside, they gave the officers consent to search the house, but no one was found. Because of the text messages sent by Burnett, he was the primary suspect in the investigation, Wieneke said.
Burnett was arrested Friday, after officers knocked on the door of his N. Eighth Street home. He was taken to Boone County Jail, the spokesman confirmed.
“There was no issues with him coming out,” Wieneke said. “He didn’t resist arrest.”
Officers discovered ammunition, drug paraphernalia, cocaine and marijuana after searching the home with Burnett’s consent, Wieneke said.
Burnett is charged with several counts of armed criminal action and first-degree assault, as well as a felony and misdemeanor possession of a controlled substance and possession of drug paraphernalia, according the news release.