Background: The apartment complex where the shooting occurred on North 94th Street in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (Google Maps). Inset left: Gregory McElwee Jr. (GoFundMe). Inset right: Joshua Jordan (Milwaukee County Sheriff”s Office).
A Wisconsin man upset about his upstairs neighbor’s noise shot and killed the victim after vowing to their landlord that he would “take care of it himself,” authorities say.
Joshua Jordan, 32, is in the Milwaukee County Jail on charges of first-degree intentional homicide, use of a dangerous weapon, operating a vehicle to flee or elude an officer, and first-degree recklessly endangering safety in connection with the death of 42-year-old Gregory McElwee Jr., court records show. The shooting occurred on Wednesday, according to a criminal complaint obtained by Law&Crime.
Jordan lived in a first-floor apartment at a complex on North 94th Street in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and McElwee lived right above him. The two men had ongoing disagreements, the court document states, citing the men’s landlord, who told investigators “that over the last month, the Defendant has been complaining about the victim being too loud at all hours of the day and night.”
The landlord reportedly had texts from Jordan, including one from May 9 in which the suspect “threatened to kill the victim.” Then on Wednesday at about 8:25 a.m., the landlord said Jordan called him “complaining about noise in the victim’s apartment.”
About 30 minutes later, the landlord got another phone call from the defendant, per the complaint. Jordan allegedly said that if the landlord “would not deal with the noise, the Defendant would take care of it himself.”
McElwee was not alone in his apartment that morning, according to authorities. His teenage son was there too, and the son said that McElwee was at work until he came home at about 9:40 a.m.
The son “stated that his dad had previously told him that their downstairs neighbor had contacted the landlord and was making a noise complaint about them, which has been an ongoing issue between the victim and that particular neighbor,” the complaint states. “[The son] stated that when the victim got home he heard the downstairs neighbor arguing in the hallway with the victim, so he went near their front door and stood there to see what [was] happening.”
The son started recording the interaction, and “[i]t was at this time that he saw that the downstairs neighbor was armed with a black handgun.” Jordan was allegedly “yelling threats at the victim, and the victim was walking away.”
Jordan then reportedly “started firing shots at the victim,” and McElwee “ran to their apartment and shut the door.” But the suspect apparently continued after him “and kicked the door open.”
The son managed to slam the door closed and lock it, but when he checked on his father, he “saw that the victim had been shot in the chest.” McElwee “did not say anything as he couldn’t speak after he had been shot,” and the son called 911.
Officers with the Milwaukee Police Department arrived at the scene and found McElwee on the floor inside his apartment “with apparent gunshot wounds to his chest.” Emergency personnel tried to save him, but he was pronounced dead.
“In the main upper hallway of the complex leading from the stairs to the victim’s” apartment, investigators said they found an unfired 9 mm Luger Hornady cartridge and a fired casing. There was blood present and damage to McElwee’s apartment, including “damage to the front door, consistent with the door getting kicked in.” There was also a shoe print on the door, which a detective “stated appeared to be the shoeprint of a Nike Air Max 95.”
Officers also spoke with another neighbor, who said she was in her kitchen when she “heard loud banging and tussling like somebody was fighting in the hallway.” She walked out into the hallway and saw a man — alleged to be Jordan — “bent over at the waist approximately 10-15 feet away with a black semi-automatic handgun in his right hand.”
She “described the suspect racking the slide back and forth on the gun,” and then said she heard the suspect say, “I told that [expletive] to stop f—ing with me.” The defendant allegedly grabbed bullets from the floor and put them in his pants pocket, and when he turned to see the neighbor, she “had both her hands in the air and said ‘please don’t shoot me,” to which he responded, “I’m not going to shoot you.”
Before officers arrived, Jordan is alleged to have driven away in a black Audi. Police searched for the vehicle, and when they spotted it, the suspect reportedly sped up to 100 mph and tried to evade them for up to 4 miles. He crashed, and police arrested him.
Authorities say Jordan was wearing Nike Air Max 95 sneakers at the time, and that when they searched his apartment, they found a gun box with “loose Hornady 9mm Luger unfired cartridges.”
The defendant is scheduled to have a preliminary hearing in court on June 11.
