Cops: Woman points rifle at grandson over water bill
A 66-year-old Ferndale grandmother is accused of pointing a rifle at her 15-year-old grandson in a dispute about the family water bill, police said.
The incident took place Sunday about 4 p.m. on the 1500 block of Leroy — south of Nine Mile, west of Livernois — when police received a 911 call from a teenager who said his grandmother had just pulled a gun on him.
Police responded and asked the woman, Jaclynn Doreatha Wedlow, if she had any guns in the house or if she’d pointed a gun at anyone. She said no, she couldn’t have, because she was just carrying a microwave.
At issue, police say, is a $1,000 water bill the woman allegedly blamed on her grandsons, who are 15 and 22. Police say the woman was apparently irate that her grandsons helped run up the bill but haven’t assisted in paying it.
While this discussion was happening, said Sgt. Baron Brown of the Ferndale Police Department, the 22-year-old was in the shower. Wedlow tried to get him out, but he didn’t leave.
Police say they believe that at this point Wedlow pulled out a .22-caliber rifle and told the 15-year-old to get his brother out of the shower, and that if the two didn’t leave, they’d get their "heads blown off."
When the 22-year-old emerged from the shower, he and his brother went upstairs and called police.
Officers asked Wedlow several times if there were guns in the home, and were told no, Brown said. They asked if they could look in the woman’s bedroom, and were told yes.
In the bedroom they found the microwave Wedlow had mentioned. But near it, “wrapped in a blanket or a tarp,” they found “what appeared to be a rifle,” Brown said, and arrested the woman. She was arraigned at Ferndale’s 43rd District Court on charges of felonious assault and domestic violence, given a $1,500 personal bond — which would only need to be paid if she missed a future court date — and ordered to stay away from the home and avoid contact with the 15-year-old.