A 39-year-old Pine Lawn man has admitted to shooting two people during a fentanyl deal that spiraled into gunfire on a North St. Louis street corner, part of a federal case that locks in a 10-year mandatory prison sentence before he's even sentenced. Terrance McKinnies pleaded guilty to discharging a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime, a single federal firearms charge tied to the December 12, 2024 shooting near Cass Avenue and Collins Avenue.
According to KTTN, McKinnies had sold fentanyl to the same group of buyers once or twice before the shooting, including earlier that same day. He directed the group to meet him at the Cass and Collins intersection, arriving first in a Chevrolet Cavalier and planning to sell more fentanyl when the buyer climbed into his passenger seat. That corner sits in the Columbus Square neighborhood, an area just north of downtown St. Louis where Cass Avenue serves as a key connector between the city's north side and downtown, according to NextSTL.
What happened next unraveled fast. An armed man approached the vehicle, yanked open the passenger door, and struggled with the buyer inside. The buyer managed to push the armed man to the ground and tried to run, but both McKinnies and the armed man opened fire on him as he fled, the station's report states. McKinnies kept shooting even after the group had driven away from the scene. The buyer was struck in the back, and another passenger in the vehicle was also shot in the back; both men survived their injuries.
A Federal Interview and a Guilty Admission
During a law enforcement interview, McKinnies said he fired because the drug transaction had gone bad, per the same account from KTTN. He is scheduled to be sentenced on January 13, and the U.S. Attorney's Office and his defense attorney have already agreed to recommend a 10-year prison sentence as part of the plea.
That recommendation isn't really optional. Under federal law, discharging a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime triggers a mandatory minimum of 10 years in prison that must run consecutively to any other sentence, according to EveryCRSReport.com. Once a defendant admits to that discharge count, federal judges have virtually no statutory room to go lower, which explains why both sides landed on the same number without a trial.
Court Record and Prosecuting Attorney
The case, formally United States v. Terrance McKinnies, Case No. 4:25-cr-00047-MAL, is assigned to U.S. District Judge Maria A. Lanahan in the Eastern District of Missouri, according to STL.News, which reported that McKinnies entered his guilty plea during a change-of-plea hearing on October 2. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jennifer Szczucinski is prosecuting the case, per KTTN's reporting. McKinnies lives in Pine Lawn, an incorporated municipality roughly 7 miles northwest of downtown St. Louis, according to the Department of Justice.
Part of a Broader Federal Push
The investigation was handled jointly by the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Justice Department noted, and prosecutors brought the case under Project Safe Neighborhoods, a federal initiative that pairs local, state, and federal agencies to target violent drug crime. The program's design prioritizes firearm charges specifically to curb gun violence tied to narcotics sales.
It's a pattern that's shown up repeatedly in St. Louis federal court. Hoodline previously reported on guilty pleas from seven members and associates of the “55 Boyz” drug gang on fentanyl trafficking and firearm charges, and a Liberty, Missouri man was handed a similar 10-year sentence following a fentanyl-related car chase.
The Numbers Behind the Headlines
McKinnies' case lands amid broader statistics showing both overdose deaths and violent crime trending downward across the region. Missouri drug overdose deaths fell 26% in 2024, with non-heroin opioid overdose deaths dropping from 1,493 in 2021 to 876 in 2024, according to KBIA, which attributed much of the decline to expanded statewide distribution of naloxone.
Violent crime has followed a similar downward trajectory. St. Louis city homicides fell to 140 in 2025, a 7.3% drop from the year before and a 47% reduction since 2020, while St. Louis County Police reported an 8.5% reduction in major crime offenses in 2025, including a 9.6% decline in homicides, according to the St. Louis County Police Department. Even as those broader numbers trend in a positive direction, cases like McKinnies' show how quickly a single street-level drug transaction can turn violent.
