Trial begins in murder of teen outside Strip District bar

By Megan Guza / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Testimony began Monday in the murder trial of a man accused of gunning down a teenage boy outside the Strip District bar where he worked in 2021.

Ahmir Tuli, 18, worked at Preeti’s Pit, a Penn Avenue restaurant and bar owned by his mother. He was a cook, and shortly after 9 p.m. Feb. 21, 2021, he took his break. About 15 minutes prior, two men had been tossed from the bar for fighting.

If that had been any other day, Assistant District Attorney Sarah Weikart told jurors, the teen would have finished his break, wrapped up his shift, gone home, and enjoyed his day off the next day.

“We wouldn’t be here if that’s what happened,” Ms. Weikart said.

Prosecutors allege that one of the men thrown out of the bar minutes earlier — Howard Hawkins — returned as Tuli and a security guard stood outside and, ultimately, shot the teenager in the head.

In the 15 minutes between when Hawkins, 49, was ejected from the bar and the time Tuli was shot, Ms. Weikart said, evidence will show that Hawkins twice went to his car, first retrieving something from the passenger side and then again heading to the vehicle before he spotted Tuli on his break.

“[There were] 15 long minutes where Howard Hawkins had the opportunity to leave and cool off,” she said.

She told jurors that a security camera captured the shooting, but it was too far away for the shooter to be easily identified. But other evidence, the prosecutor assured them, would prove to them beyond a reasonable doubt that Hawkins was the one who shot Tuli, who died several hours later.

Defense attorney Ashley Cagle, however, told jurors she believes the evidence won’t stack up.

“You will find that the [prosecution] has fallen far short of that burden,” Ms. Cagle said, urging the jury of eight men and four women not to “check common sense at the door.”

The two Pittsburgh police officers who were the first on the scene the night of the shooting were the only witnesses to testify before court adjourned. Officers Vincent Gelpi and James Verbitsky testified to the ShotSpotter alert they received shortly after 9 p.m. that night and to the chaotic scene to which they arrived.

Both officers described crowds of people in the street outside the restaurant and around Tuli, who was on the ground with a gunshot wound to the head. The officers tried to give aid to the teen until paramedics arrived.

Ms. Cagle pointed to discrepancies between the suspect description officers said they received on the way to the scene and the description that ended up in Officer Verbitsky’s report at the end of the night. The officer said he relied on descriptions that other officers collected from witnesses at the scene.

Testimony will resume Tuesday morning.