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Cheryl Schilling and her husband, Kevin, ran to an upstairs bedroom and closed the door after Armond Anthony Avitable grabbed a pump-action shotgun during an argument at their home in the Knowlton Township community of Columbia shortly before 8 p.m. Monday, Feb. 12, they said.
Avitable then kicked open the door and fired two shotgun blasts, both of which wounded the 58-year-old woman, Warren County Prosecutor James L. Pfeiffer said.
Avitable, 38, of East Stroudsburg, PA, ran outside and told neighbors who'd been enjoying an outdoor fire that he "had to shoot her because [Kevin Schilling] was coming for him," the prosecutor said.
He then unloaded two more shots into the house, tossed the shotgun into the neighbor's backyard and fled on foot, Pfeiffer said.
New Jersey State Police troopers who flooded the area found Avitable a short distance away at the intersection of Routes 46 and 80. He was said to be "covered in tattoos" -- hence, not difficult to identify. Sources also said he was high on cocaine.
Avitable "engaged the [troopers] in a physical altercation," Pfeiffer said. "He was subdued and taken into custody."
Avitable suffered a medical emergency moments later, the prosecutor said. He was taken to Lehigh Valley Pocono Medical Center in East Stroudsburg, where Pfeiffer said he was pronounced dead at 9:01 p.m.
Cheryl Schilling, whose online bio says she'd been a United States Postal Service carrier the past 9Β½ years, was pronounced dead at her Columbia Street home at 8:28 p.m., according to the prosecutor.
A native of Budd Lake, she was graduated from Mount Olive High School and had once been a school bus driver.
Because Schilling's death followed an encounter with law enforcement, state law requires New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin's office to conduct an investigation.
This is done no matter the circumstances.
It guarantees that the investigation is done βin a full, impartial and transparent manner," removing politics or personal agendas, Platkin has said.
Once the probe by the attorney general's Office of Public Integrity and Accountability (OPIA) team is completed, the results will be presented to a grand jury βin a neutral, objective manner, and with appropriate transparency,β he said.
The panel will then render a ruling on whether or not there is cause to suspect criminality.
Someone in the early weeks of the process, police body camera footage and images captured by area security cameras are shared with Avitable's family and then publicly released.
Avitable apparently had been kicked out of his home on Club House Drive during a domestic dispute sometime before dusk Monday, said Pfeiffer, the Warren County prosecutor. Seeking shelter, he called Kevin Schilling.
Schilling went to pick him up and brought Avitable back with him, the prosecutor said. They got there around 6 p.m., he said.
Then came the horror.
State Police troopers from various barracks immediately responded, along with multiple ALS and BLS units. Area roadways were closed and the community was directed to shelter in place.
State Police troopers and detectives, along with investigators from the Warren County Prosecutor's Office, worked deep into the night gathering evidence that included the gun, as well as home security video from the neighborhood.
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