A 25-year-old Farmville man is sitting in the Pitt County Detention Center without bond, accused of firing a semi-automatic handgun into an occupied home and at an occupied vehicle in Winterville this summer. Aaron Dawson Baker now faces multiple felony charges stemming from the July 9 shooting, according to a Greenville Police Department warrant.
The warrant, issued September 25, alleges that Baker fired into the occupied home and vehicle intending to incite fear, as reported by WCTI. The same warrant also accuses him of assaulting a man with a firearm with intent to kill.
Per the warrant, Baker faces three separate felony counts: discharging a firearm into occupied property, discharging a firearm into an occupied vehicle to incite fear, and assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill. The charges are connected to the July shooting in Pitt County, and Baker remains held without bond at the Pitt County Detention Center while awaiting his next court date.
What the Charges Carry Under State Law
The discharging-into-occupied-property charge falls under North Carolina General Statute § 14-34.1, which covers anyone who willfully or wantonly discharges or attempts to discharge a firearm or certain barreled weapon at occupied property, according to the North Carolina General Assembly. The assault charge falls under a separate statute, § 14-32, which addresses felonious assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill or inflicting serious injury, and is punished as a Class C felony, per the North Carolina General Assembly's published text of G.S. 14-32.
Baker is scheduled to appear in Pitt County court on October 21. The warrant's full allegations, including the exact address of the shooting and whether anyone suffered injuries, were not detailed in the available court records.
Firearm Violence Trends Across the State
The case surfaces as North Carolina officials have been tracking firearm violence trends more broadly. A March 2026 release from the North Carolina Department of Public Safety says an analysis drawing on the most recent five years of available data identified trends in firearm homicide, nonfatal shootings, firearm suicide and other firearm-related harms across the state. “We now have a clearer picture of when, where and how firearm violence is occurring across North Carolina,” said Caroline Farmer, executive director of the Governor's Crime Commission, according to the department's findings. Farmer added that the data is meant to inform “state initiatives for grant funding, targeted prevention strategies and policies that address the growing firearm violence in rural areas across our state.”
The department had separately published a Pitt County Violence Profile in April 2025, part of its ongoing effort to document local patterns of violence in the county where Baker is now jailed. No additional details about Baker's legal representation or prior record were available as of publication.
