At least 16 shots fired in basketball court slaying, police say

Justin Griffith messaged his girlfriend the night of July 5, 2021, worried that something was about to go down, according to police.

A group of masked guys, wearing warmer clothes in the summer heat, walked up as “aggressors” on a basketball court where Griffith and two other men were playing at Cousler Park, police said.

Bullets soon flew — about 16 of them, according to investigators. One of them struck the Spring Garden Township man, killing him.

The suspect, Elijah Penn, fled to eastern York County, police said.

He allegedly told people he knows that he was the shooter.

Following a year-and-a-half of investigation, Penn now faces a potential jury trial while charged with homicide, attempted homicide, aggravated assault and reckless endangerment.

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The 19-year-old York City man appeared before District Court Judge Jeffery Oberdorf on Thursday for a preliminary hearing in his case.

Penn was charged Jan. 4 following the police investigation and a subsequent grand jury investigation.

Northern York County Regional Police Detective Stephen Lebo testified at the preliminary hearing that cell phone data and witness statements helped lead to the arrest.

The night of the shooting, the 20-year-old Griffith was playing basketball at Cousler Park in Manchester Township with at least two other people, including a man named Donald Dent.

Witnesses told investigators that people in masks walked onto the court and faced Griffith and Dent’s team, according to Lebo. The group seemed out of place, he said, because they were wearing long-sleeved shirts and long pants in 95-degree heat.

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Griffith messaged his girlfriend through Facebook and told her “ops” were at the park, Lebo said, citing an investigation of Griffith’s phone.

“Ops,” the detective described, meant along the lines of opposing gang members.

Penn’s attorney, Ron Gross, asked that if someone referenced opposing gang members like that, could that mean the person’s in another gang.

Lebo said he couldn’t say that someone using the word “ops” would make them a gang member. He also said nobody in the investigation identified Griffith as a gang member.

Griffith also wasn’t a target in the shooting.

Lebo said Penn pointed that out when investigators interviewed him.

“I believe in his terms that were provided to us, ‘We won a game anyway,’” Lebo testified.

Investigators collected at least 16 9mm shell casings from the scene, Lebo said. And charging documents allege Penn fired them all during the confrontation.

Griffith was shot once, apparently in the back, which killed him.

Dent was shot in the foot and injured.

Lebo said cell phone data showed Penn, who was 17 years old at the time, fled the park after the shooting and went to a relative’s home in Hellam Township.

Evidence showed Penn called at least one person at a state prison July 6 and allegedly talked about the shooting.

“An incident occurred at the park the night before, and that he shot someone,” Lebo said.

Another person who knows Penn also told investigators that he took credit for the shooting, and a witness had identified him at the scene.

Gross didn’t argue against taking the homicide and reckless endangerment charges to a jury trial in the York County Court of Common Pleas.

However, he fought the attempted homicide and aggravated assault charges, which specifically refer to Dent’s injury. Gross said there wasn’t a specific intent to kill Dent or cause serious bodily injury.

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After court, he pointed out Dent testified earlier in the hearing that his foot was grazed in the incident. He said Dent clearly wasn't seriously injured, in spite of what the charge alleged.

Judge Oberdorf disagreed. He said if he pointed a gun and started shooting at the approximately 20 people in the courtroom for the hearing, they would think he was trying to kill them.

The judge ordered all the charges in the case to advance to the common pleas level. There, the case could potentially go to trial and be decided by a jury.

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Penn, who’s in custody at the York County Prison without bail, is now scheduled to be formally arraigned before a common pleas judge on Feb. 21, court documents show.

Gross declined to comment on the case Thursday, saying it's in the beginning phases and too early to discuss defense strategy.

— Reach Aimee Ambrose at aambrose@yorkdispatch.com or on Twitter at @aimee_TYD.