The 23-year-old man’s authorities said they opened fire in the parking lot of a Walmart super center in Whitehall on Friday, killing an Allentown woman and injuring a man.
The records lehighvalleylive.com received on Monday shed more light on the case. According to court records, Edward Joel Rosario-Jimenez of Whitehall Township arrived at Walmart on MacArthur Road just before 7 p.m. He was driving a black Toyota SUV with three other people, one of whom was the mother of a child who was about to attend a custody swap in the store’s parking lot.
Court records do not reveal the relationship between Rosario-Jimenez and the child’s mother.
The Toyota, authorities said, pulled up behind a vehicle with at least two occupants – the child’s father and 20-year-old Nicolette Law from Allentown – parked in the store’s goods collection department. Court records give no indication of whether a child was in a vehicle or indicate the relationship between the law and the child’s father.
Witnesses told investigators who argued over the custody exchange prior to the exchange of fire. The responding officers found Law and the male victim shot in the parking lot shortly before 7 p.m.
The mother told investigators that Rosario-Jimenez started arguing with the child’s father and shot him and Law. The man is being hospitalized, authorities said.
The Lehigh District Attorney’s office Jim Martin wouldn’t say if the child was in the car or if the rendition ever took place. The office also declined to comment on other issues related to adult relationships and the health of the child’s father.
The bill was moved to Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest in Salisbury Township, where she was pronounced dead at 7:40 p.m. on Friday, according to the Lehigh County Coroner Office.
Authorities have identified the woman who was killed in the Friday shootings outside the Walmart Supercenter as 20-year-old Nicolette Law from Allentown.
Everyone fled after the shootout in the Toyota, leaving Rosario-Jimenez in the parking lot, court records show. A pistol used in the crime was confiscated by investigators from a snowbank next to the parking lot, authorities said.
Rosario-Jimenez was taken into custody in Whitehall Township on Sunday. According to court records, he admitted the shooting.
Rosario-Jimenez was charged on Sunday with criminal murder, attempted criminal murder and aggravated assault, and unlicensed carrying of a firearm, all crimes. He was taken to Lehigh County Jail without bail. He will appear for a preliminary court hearing, expected to be held on March 8th at 12:00 noon before District Judge Donna Butler.
Pamela Sroka-Holzmann can be reached at [email protected].
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