A person of interest in connection with Friday’s shots fired incident in Lansdale Borough and subsequent standoff in North Wales Borough was taken into custody on weapons and drug charges early Tuesday morning, following an unrelated incident at the Quality Inn in Montgomery Township.
Montgomery Township Police were completing a warrant service along the 600 block of Bethlehem Pike at 12:09 a.m. on July 26 when they encountered a vehicle stopped in the parking lot with a woman screaming from inside. Police approached the vehicle and made contact with the driver, as well as the front-seat passenger, identified as Christopher Gring, 39, of North Wales.
According to charging documents, Gring was non-compliant, disobeyed commands and made “unnatural movements” around the vehicle until he was physically removed from the vehicle at taser point. Police said the handle of a firearm was visible under Gring’s seat, which turned out to be a loaded P80 ghost gun with a laser sight attached.
Gring is prohibited from possession a firearm due to prior felony arrests, according to court records.
Further search of the vehicle uncovered empty firearm magazines, 48 unidentified blue pills and two plastic bags containing suspected crystal meth, police said.
As a result of the incident, Gring has been charged with felony counts of prohibited possession of a firearm and firearms not to be carried without a license, along with misdemeanor counts of possession of a controlled substance and possession of drug paraphernalia.
Gring is currently being held at the Montgomery County Correctional Facility in lieu of $5,000 cash bail, and his preliminary hearing is scheduled for Aug. 16 at 10 a.m. in front of District Judge Andrea Duffy.
Court records show that Gring was arrested in Montgomery Township in October 2021 on more than a dozen weapons and drug charges, after police allegedly found him to be in custody of drugs and four firearms during a traffic stop. Gring was initially given $5,000 cash bail on that case, but eight days later bail was reduced to unsecured and he was freed from custody.
Several weeks after being released from custody, Gring was arrested in Whitemarsh Township on felony and misdemeanor drug charges, as well as a misdemeanor count of DUI following a traffic stop, court records show. Gring was initially remanded to county jail after failing to post $50,000 cash bail, however bail was later lowered to $10,000 cash, which he posted a short time later, court records show.
Both of those cases remain active within the Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas.
Upon viewing the criminal complaint stemming from Tuesday’s arrest in Montgomery Township, this news organization noticed the address listed for Gring matched the location of a standoff in North Wales Borough that occurred on July 22 and was proceeded by a shots-fired incident in Lansdale Borough earlier that day.
When reached by phone, Lansdale Borough Police Chief Michael Trail confirmed that Gring was on location during the incident in North Wales and has been labeled a person of interest in their investigation.
Police were initially dispatched to the unit block of East Third Street in Lansdale at 5:53 a.m. on July 22 for a report of shots fired at a house. No injuries were reported, and witnesses described seeing a black vehicle leaving the area of the shooting.
Trail said the preliminary investigation determined that a firearm was discharged in that area, however there was no evidence the shot that was fired was targeted towards a person or residence.
Police from Upper Gwynedd Township observed the suspect vehicle on Wissahickon Avenue and later located the vehicle along the 200 block of Elm Avenue in North Wales Borough. Trail said Lansdale Police secured search warrants for the suspect’s vehicle and the residence the suspect entered, then notified North Wales Borough Police of the warrants.
At that time, North Wales Police requested assistance to serve the warrant from the Montgomery County SWAT – Central Region Team, as the initial incident in Lansdale involved a firearm being discharged and one resident of the home — now identified as Gring — was already facing weapons charges from the October 2021 arrest in Montgomery Township.
Police identified three persons of interest who were inside of the home — Gring, another adult male, and a juvenile — however none of the three would initially answer the door. Around 11 a.m., the unidentified adult male exited the home and was subsequently detained on an unrelated summary warrant. The suspect was later released after processing, police said.
A short time later, the juvenile suspect exited the home, and afterwards, Gring exited the home. With all three out of the residence, investigators then entered the home and executed the search warrant.
The vehicle was towed from the scene so police could execute the second search warrant.
Trail said police did not have an arrest warrant for any of the three suspects and added they could not make an arrest outside of their jurisdiction without one. All three remain as persons of interest, and the investigation into the shots fired incident is ongoing.
The scene was cleared around 2 p.m., Trail said.
All suspects and defendants are innocent until proven guilty. This story was compiled using court records and the affidavit of probable cause.
See also:
New Details Provided from Friday’s Shots Fired, SWAT Incidents in Lansdale and North Wales
Photos: Shooting Incident in Lansdale Borough Leads to Swat Standoff in North Wales
Man Accused of Raping 7-Year-Old Girl in Hatfield
Man Accused of Repeatedly Sexually Fondling Local Elderly Woman Who is Blind, Deaf and Mute
