Lawyer: Report doesn't implicate Joe Mixon in Anderson Twp. shooting. What we know

An incident report on shots fired from the backyard of a home connected to Joe Mixon in Anderson Township did not list the Cincinnati Bengals running back as a person of interest.

His legal team has received the incident report and "we're pleased that their investigation doesn't reflect that Joe did anything wrong," said Merlyn Shiverdecker, a lawyer representing Mixon.

Though the incident report lists two suspects, the sheriff's office has yet to file charges in relation to the shooting, though investigators are still conducting interviews and reviewing evidence.

The Enquirer also reached out on Thursday to the Bengals organization and Mixon's agent Peter Schaffer. Neither responded to phone calls and texts.

Here's what we know about the shooting.

Report says shots came from home tied to Joe Mixon

An incident report released by the sheriff's office on Thursday states the shots were fired from the backyard of a house on Ayers Road tied to Mixon on Monday.

Two juvenile witnesses told deputies they were playing "dart wars" with the 16-year-old victim at his house. The teenager ran around the side of his house with a Nerf-style toy gun when an unknown person opened fire.

Witnesses and the 16-year-old victim, who was struck in the foot, told deputies the person fired around 11 shots at the teen and continued to fire as he was running away, the report states.

The report lists four teen witnesses, one 48-year-old witness and one witness whose age is not listed.

Court documents connect Mixon to the house. An aggravated menacing warrant filed against Mixon lists the Ayers Road residence as his address. The menacing charge was later dismissed.

The sheriff's office has said Mixon is associated with the home, though his exact connection with that address remains unclear. A trust is listed as the owner of the house, according to the Hamilton County auditor's website.

Was anyone injured?

The teen was shot in the foot and hid nearby until the shots ceased and he was able to make it inside his home, according to the sheriff's office report.

He was later taken to the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. A dispatch report said the juvenile tried to decline medical attention and that his father is a doctor.

911 call describes chaos following the shooting

Deputies were dispatched to the reported shooting around 8:25 p.m. Monday.

In a 911 call recording, a caller said he was with "his athlete" at an address that matches the home associated with Mixon.

"There was a shooting next door to the house," the caller said. "There were some kids blocking off ... in three, four cars ... blocking off the road and one kid was running around brandishing a weapon. He went back to his car and it looked like it was a fake weapon, but then I kept walking, walking, walking.

"Then he was screaming something and he went back to his car and he pulled out another weapon. It looked like a Kel-Tec (gun) or something, and ran up the back driveway of this house that he's going up and down," he said in the call. "Then all of sudden you heard him running down there and you heard pop, pop, pop, pop, pop and then the three other cars sped off."

Kel-Tec is a brand of firearm. The company manufactures handguns and rifles.

What did investigators find at the scene?

Investigators recovered the Nerf gun and three shell casings, the report said. Deputies also stopped a black Honda, occupied by two people, seen leaving the residence from which the gunshots were fired and a rifle was recovered from inside the vehicle.

The Enquirer isn't naming the occupants of the car, listed as "suspects" on the incident report, as no charges have been filed against them.

Are there suspects in the shooting?

A female and a male who is not Joe Mixon are listed as suspects in the shooting on Ayers Road in the report released Thursday. Charges have not been filed against either person,

Principal warned of 'dart wars' prior to shooting

In a newsletter to parents sent Feb. 17, Turpin High School principal David Spencer addressed dart wars. Turpin is in the Forest Hills School District along with Anderson High School. Anderson officials confirmed the juvenile injured on Monday was a student there.

Spencer explained that this is a student-led activity that is not school-sponsored. He said the game cannot be played on school grounds or disrupt education in any way.

He encouraged parents to talk to their kids about safety. He said the game has led students to hide around homes, drive recklessly and make unsafe decisions. Over the past several years, the sheriff's office has been called at least once each year about dart wars.

A Twitter account dedicated to the 2023 Anderson dart wars game tweeted about an hour after the shooting Monday that all dart wars play is to be stopped immediately and suspended indefinitely, "due to an unforeseen event that occurred tonight."

What we still don't know

We don't know:

• If Joe Mixon owns the house or lives in it.

• Was Joe Mixon at the house at the time of the shooting.

• Who fired 11 shots at the teens.

• If law enforcement plans to file charges.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Lawyer: Anderson Township shooting report doesn't implicate Joe Mixon