Harford County Police are searching a Baltimore County man charged with fatally shooting a 25-year-old man and wounding a 15-year-old girl in downtown Bel Air early Sunday.
Detectives have issued a warrant for Rakin Raid Muhammad, 20, of the 1600 block of Wentworth Ave. in Parkville in connection with Bel Air's first homicide in more than four years, police said.
In Sunday's shooting, officers responding to a call about gunshots shortly before 2 a.m., found Derrick Maxey Jr. of Aberdeen dead in a rear parking lot of the American Legion at 115 N. Bond St.
A few minutes later, staff at Upper Chesapeake Medical Center in Bel Air reported that a 15-year-old girl entered the emergency room with a gunshot wound in her leg. The girl was later taken by Maryland State Police Medevac helicopter to Maryland Shock Trauma Center.
Police believe the girl was shot at the parking lot where Maxey was killed, which is a block away from Main Street in downtown Bel Air.
In 2007, when Muhammad was 17, he faced attempted first-degree murder, assault and related charges for "violently and repeatedly" striking a 44-year-old man with a baseball bat and kicking him; he was left paralyzed from the waist down after a brawl. Among the charges was a little-used gang statute passed by the state legislature in recent years.
Muhammad pleaded guilty to a single count of second-degree assault and was sentenced to 10 years with all but three and a half years suspended.
According to court records, Maxey was charged with attempted first-degree murder, armed robbery and related charges in January 2008 in Baltimore, but prosecutors dropped the case. Margaret T. Burns, a spokeswoman for the Baltimore state's attorney's office, said it was determined that Maxey was a victim and that the people reporting the crime were eventually charged and prosecuted, she said.
The same month, Maxey was charged in Baltimore with illegal handgun possession and, three months later, received an 18-month suspended sentence, court records show.
Bel Air's last homicide occurred in May 2006, when Michael R. Simmons stabbed Patrick J. Walker of Bel Air twice in the neck after Walker cut him off in traffic.
Simmons pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and is now serving a 30-year prison sentence, court records show.
Anyone with information on the case can call 410-638-4500 or 1-888-540-8477.