Butler man sentenced in Jan. 18 mall shooting
The Butler man charged in the Jan. 18 shooting at Clearview Mall pleaded guilty and was sentenced Thursday to serve time in jail followed by a lengthy probation.
Carlos Gonzalez Carril, 24, of Butler was sentenced in Common Pleas Court to serve 10 to 20 months in Butler County Prison followed by 72 months of probation. He was given credit for having already served 303 days in jail.
Judge Kelley Streib ordered the sentence after Gonzalez Carril pleaded guilty to six misdemeanor charges of recklessly endangering another person in a plea agreement.
In addition to those charges, state police initially charged him with three felony counts of attempted homicide, six felony counts of aggravated assault and three misdemeanor counts of simple assault.
Police said Gonzalez Carril fired numerous gunshots from a vehicle at Damian Blystone, 19, Ryan Ehrman, 21, and a juvenile male who were inside another vehicle in the parking lot between Rural King and Boscov’s around 6:30 p.m. Blystone and the juvenile were shot in the back of their heads, and Ehrman was shot in the right side of his torso. Their injuries were minor. A confrontation inside Rural King preceded the shooting. The mall was locked down following the incident.
Blystone, who is accused of pointing a gun at Gonzalez Carril, has been arrested twice on various charges including gun, stolen property, assault and drug offenses since the incident. Those cases, as well as a 2021 case involving stolen property and firearms charges, remain pending in Common Pleas Court.
Ehrman is facing a preliminary hearing in February next year on driving under the influence charges stemming from an Aug. 19 traffic stop in Butler Township.
District Attorney Richard Goldinger said the case against Gonzalez Carril would have been difficult to prove in court, and he received an appropriate sentence that will keep him under court supervision for almost seven years.
“The victim might have instigated so (Gonzalez Carril) could have claimed self-defense,” Goldinger said. “The victim has been in trouble since then.”
