When he attempted to enter the incorrect home early on Saturday morning, a 20-year-old University of South Carolina student was tragically shot, according to authorities.
According to a press release from the Columbia Police Department, officers discovered 20-year-old Nicholas Anthony Donofrio dead from an upper-body gunshot wound on the front porch of the house on South Holly Street, roughly two miles from the campus of the university.
Donofrio lived on that block, according to the police, and was shot while attempting to enter the wrong house.
According to a police news release, a 911 call reporting a home burglary was escalated to “shots fired call” as officers were en route to the scene. The call originally came in shortly before 2 a.m.
According to authorities, Donofrio was recognized by the Richland County Coroner’s Office.
Police sleuths “will continue to consult with the Fifth Circuit Solicitor’s Office regarding the circumstances of the case,” the news release states. There have not yet been any charges, according to a police spokesperson.
According to the Giffords Statute Center to Prevent Gun Violence, a nonprofit advocacy group, South Carolina has a “stand your ground” statute that permits someone to use lethal force in self-defense if they aren’t in violation of the law and are in an area where they have a right to be. According to the Giffords Law Center, the state does not require licenses from gun owners in order to acquire or buy a firearm.
Police claim that Donofrio is a native of Connecticut. On Monday, it was impossible to call his parents right away.
According to a statement from Craig Cooke, the superintendent of Madison County Public Schools, and Anthony Salutari, Jr., the school’s administrator, Donofrio graduated from Daniel Hand High School in 2021 in Madison, a town about 20 miles east of New Haven.
A representative for the University of South Carolina said in a statement that Donofrio was a sophomore and that the school’s Student Affairs staff is offering support to students in the wake of the tragedy.
According to his LinkedIn profile, Donofrio was pursuing a degree in kinesiology and exercise science.
The tragic shooting is the most recent in a line of disasters identical to it, in which Americans have been shot — occasionally fatally — for doing anything wrong.
In Kansas City, Missouri, in April, Ralph Yarl, a 16-year-old Black teenager, was shot by Andrew Lester, an elderly white man, after he knocked on the wrong doorbell while trying to pick up his younger brothers. Yarl managed to survive, but he claims that the gunshot is still having an impact on him and that this includes attention problems.
Lester is accused of first-degree assault and armed criminal activity. He entered a not-guilty plea, was given a $200,000 bond, and was told to give up his passport, his gun, and all contact with Yarl. He may receive a maximum term of life in prison for the assault accusation and three to 15 years for the firearms charge if he is proven guilty.
Days after killing Yarl, 65-year-old Kevin Monahan shot and killed 20-year-old Kaylin Gillis in upstate New York when she was riding in a car that had accidentally turned into his driveway. When charged with second-degree murder, Monahan entered a not-guilty plea.
A third-degree felony charge of deadly conduct was brought against Pedro Tello Rodriguez Jr., 25, for shooting two Texas cheerleaders in the parking lot of a supermarket approximately twenty-five miles northeast of Austin after one of them got into the incorrect vehicle. One of the cheerleaders was badly injured. Rodriguez Jr. may still be in prison, but it was unclear whether he had entered a plea, and a police representative could not be reached right away.
Experts and proponents of gun control have attributed the incidents to loose gun regulations and an uptick in inflammatory mainstream political discourse.