CLEVELAND, OH — The man Cleveland police said fired into a Jeep SUV with a father and two kids inside this week, grazing the man and wounding the little girl, has a history of criminal convictions dating back more than a dozen years.
Tevin Copes of Cleveland was locked up, being held in jail on a $1 million bond Friday night, charged with felonious assault.
Police said the 33-year-old fired into the SUV around 8:15 p.m. Wednesday near the West 25th Street exit of Interstate 71 southbound in Cleveland.
According to court records, a 9-year-old girl inside the SUV was shot in the left knee and right leg.
Police said she is out of the hospital and recovering.
A 6-year-old boy, who was also inside at the time of the shooting, was not hurt.
Investigators said video from the highway, victim statements and shell casings led them to Copes.
Cleveland police said he was arrested after a brief foot chase Thursday evening.
Records from Cuyahoga County jail show Copes has been booked 18 different times dating back to June 2012.
Court records show he’s been sentenced to prison twice on drug and weapons charges and was just sentenced to serve five years of probation on July 20, 2026, after convictions for strangulation, domestic violence and being a felon with a gun.
A judge also ordered Copes to complete an anger management program as part of his sentence in that case.
The woman named in court records as the victim in that case has the same name as the victim in a February 2022 domestic violence case.
The man convicted in that case is the driver of the SUV that police said Copes shot into Wednesday.
Investigators have not released a motive for this week’s attack, but in a statement, Cleveland police said it was not a random act of violence and said the victim and suspect “are known to one another.”
