Police: Clover man shot at teen on ATV, charged with attempted murder

A Clover man fired a handgun at a teenager riding an ATV near his home, the York County Sheriff’s Office said Tuesday, because he was “tired of these four-wheelers speeding up and down the road.”

Aubrey Dale Denton, 63, of Whiteside Road, was charged with attempted murder and kidnapping in connection with the shooting. He was placed in the York County detention center, where he remained Tuesday without bond.

The incident happened at about 8:20 p.m. Monday on Whitesides Road in Clover, according to a sheriff’s report. A woman told deputies she was driving on Whitesides Road, trying to find her son, who had been riding his four-wheel all-terrain vehicle. Her son told police that as he was passing a home in the 300 block of Whitesides Road, “he saw a man in the ditch and then he saw the man point a gun at him and fire a shot at him.”

The 17-year-old said he covered his head with his arm and sped away. When he heard the shot, he said, he also heard “something go by his head,” the report states.

After Denton fired at the teen, the report states, he turned and aimed the gun at the boy’s mother and would not let her drive away. The woman said she then heard Denton’s wife yelling at him to put the gun down.

Deputies spoke with Denton, who was sitting on a bench in the front yard of his home near the road, the report states. When an officer asked what happened, the report states, Denton said “he was tired of these four-wheelers speeding up and down the road, so he went to the ditch and shot at a boy on a four-wheeler.”

Denton gave officers permission to enter his home and seize the Springfield XD pistol, which had a round in the chamber and was in a holster hanging on a recliner, according to the report. Denton said he reloaded the gun in case the boy he shot at came back to his house.

This story was originally published July 21, 2015 at 3:00 PM with the headline "Police: Clover man shot at teen on ATV, charged with attempted murder."