Philadelphia man charged in road rage shooting on Schuylkill Expressway

Beccah Hendrickson Image
Thursday, January 18, 2024
Philadelphia man charged in road rage shooting on I-76
Philadelphia man charged in road rage shooting on Schuylkill Expressway

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- A 22-year-old Philadelphia man has been charged in a road rage shooting that happened Wednesday evening along the Schuylkill Expressway.

Fahzeem Ponder is facing charges including aggravated assault, terroristic threats, and weapons offenses for the incident that happened at 6:45 p.m. on I-76 eastbound near the City Avenue exit.

Investigators say Ponder got in a road rage argument with another driver and shot at that person. Police say the bullet didn't hit the victim or any other cars, but Ponder drove off.

The victim called 911 and police say they pulled Ponder over on 676, where they found a .40 caliber ghost gun that matched shell casings on the scene.

Police also say Ponder was trying to intimidate the other driver with the gun.

While no one was hurt, this was still a disturbing and dangerous incident on the road.

According to the Gun Violence Archive, over the last 12 months, there have been 18 reported road rage shootings in the Philadelphia metro area. Only three of them happened on highways while 15 happened on surface streets.

"If you flip somebody off, you know, they could shoot you," said Katie Frankenfield from Conshohocken.

Drivers say cases like this are forcing them to think about how they react on the roads.

"The fear of somebody getting out of the car and overreacting," said Frankenfield.

"I might start following that strategy going forward and just got caring so much because honestly, it's never the end of the world usually," said Henry Far from Manayunk.