A judge in Pennsylvania has been suspended after allegations claimed she shot her ex-boyfriend in the head while he slept at his home.
The shooting took place on the morning of February 10th at the Harrisburg home of the victim, Michael McCoy, 54, after he tried to end his 1-year relationship with Magisterial District Judge Sonya M. McKnight, 57.
The bullet entered the right side of McCoy’s face and exited the left side of his face. He luckily survived the shooting, but is now blind in one eye.
McKnight is now being charged with attempted murder and aggravated assault.
After McCoy broke up with McKnight he had tried to get her to move out of his home multiple times, but she refused to leave. Despite taking away McKnight’s key to his home, he returned home to find her wearing pajamas while sitting on his couch. It appeared she had used a spare key to enter McCoy’s home while he was at work.
McCoy then left the home for a nearby bar after telling McKnight he planned to ask her mother for help removing her from the home.
“At this point Sonya McKnight responds, ‘Oh, You’re serious?’ Michael McCoy stated that it was like she finally understood that it was over,” police wrote in their report during the investigation.
Then, McCoy went to sleep around 11 p.m. that evening. However, McCoy woke up a couple hours later to massive head pain and was unable to see. As he began to scream in pain, McKnight asked him, “Mike what did you do to yourself?”
Despite McKnight’s claims that he shot himself, McCoy denied the accusations both at the scene to police and again when being treated at the hospital.
McKnight had called 911 just before 1 a.m. to report that her boyfriend was unable to see, but said she “could not explain what happened and stated that she was sleeping and heard him screaming,” police wrote in the affidavit.
The affidavit also alleges that McKnight’s interview with detectives “was found to be deceptive” and the gun used to shoot McCoy was registered to her. Additionally, a test conducted within an hour of the shooting found gun residue on her hands.
McKnight also claimed that she did not leave the Harrisburg home the night of the shooting, but videos police obtained from McCoy’s neighbors’ doorbell cameras contradicted this, investigators said. McCoy told police he suspected she had checked on him while he was at the bar.
McKnight was taken into custody on the afternoon of Thursday, Feb. 15, according to the Cumberland County District Attorney’s Office. She is currently being held at the Dauphin County Prison with bail set at $300,000, and a preliminary hearing is scheduled for Feb. 26.
Last November, McKnight was suspended without pay following claims that she violated judicial probation in a misconduct case regarding a 2020 traffic stop involving her son. However, she was acquitted of any criminal charges.
In 2019, McKnight was cleared in the shooting of her estranged husband, who was shot in the groin. Prosecutors declined to file criminal charges, citing self-defense.
