CONWAY, SC (WBTW) – A man involved in a domestic incident last month has been charged with assault and harassment after a woman he was reportedly following feared for her life and shot him.
Andrew Lanier, 55, of Georgetown, faces first degree harassment and second degree assault and battery charges, police say. Booking records show he was taken to the J Reuben Long Detention Center Tuesday.
The Horry County Police Department says officers were called to the hospital around 12:30 a.m. on September 22 for a victim with a gunshot wound. According to a press release from Horry County police, officers discovered the domestic incident took place on Myrtle Greens Drive in Conway.
The warrant for the assault charge says Andrew Lanier parked his car in a concealed part of the apartment complex and waited for the woman to come home. When she arrived, he reportedly ran towards her “yelling about her cheating on him, forcing [her] to fear for her life and safety.”
Next, she drew her gun, “pleaded” for him to stop running at her and when he didn’t stop approaching her, she fired one shot at Lanier.
The warrants state after the woman shot Lanier, he threw her to the ground and began slamming her head into the pavement. As they wrestled for the gun, the woman fired two more shots, one of which hit Lanier.
The warrant for harassment states that the woman sustained injuries to her face, head, arms and legs. The harassment warrant also explains that the pair had previously been in a relationship, but ended that relationship several months before the incident. Since the breakup, Lanier had shown up at the woman’s workplace, home and other public places she was known to frequent without being invited.
“Mr. Lanier has demonstrated a pattern of intentional, substantial and unreasonable intrusion into the private life of [the victim] causing her to reasonably fear for her safety,” the warrant states.
When the officers arrived at the hospital, the woman was sitting in the driver’s seat of a burgundy Mercedes just outside the emergency room entrance. A security guard at the hospital told officers he had removed a gun from the car and set it on the vehicle’s roof. The woman inside the car was upset and complaining of injuries, according to the police report.
Officers eventually got the woman to get out of the car and sit in a wheelchair. Paper bags were placed over the woman’s hands to “preserve evidence,” the report says.
Police say the woman and Lanier were both treated for their injuries.
Online booking records confirm Lanier was being held on a $10,000 bond at the Horry County Detention Center until he was released around 1:30 p.m., just hours before he was booked at 8 a.m.
