In Evansville, Indiana, a single gunshot tragically ended the life of 41-year-old Toni Raie Salee-Bittler on June 1, 2018. A woman known for her compassionate heart and her love of baking, she was discovered by her husband in their apartment suffering from a gunshot wound to her torso. She was rushed to St. Vincent Hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
The fatal shot, it was soon discovered, had not been fired from within her own home.
Investigators found a bullet hole in the wall that separated Bittler's apartment from a neighboring unit. The investigation led them next door, where they determined a gun had been fired during an argument between a man and a woman. The bullet had traveled through the shared wall, striking the unsuspecting Bittler. The occupant of the neighboring apartment, 32-year-old Ricardo Abreu, was identified as the person who fired the weapon.
Abreu was subsequently arrested and faced charges of murder-reckless homicide and shooting a firearm into an inhabited dwelling. In a resolution to the case in December of 2018, Abreu pleaded guilty to reckless homicide and criminal recklessness. As part of a plea agreement, an additional charge of criminal recklessness was dismissed.
For his role in the senseless death of Toni Bittler, Ricardo Abreu was sentenced to serve 30 months in prison for each charge, with the sentences to run concurrently. He was given credit for the 201 days he had already been in custody since his arrest. During the sentencing, Bittler's grieving husband and father spoke of the profound loss their family had endured.
