Elijah Paris grew up in Washington state, living with his twin sister, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother and great-great-grandmother.
His father left when he and his sister were 2 years old and remained out of touch for more than a decade before reconnecting with them.
Still, Yohance Paris said he only saw his son about once a year over the past eight years. The fact that Elijah Paris had been shot and killed in the Shadyside neighborhood of Pittsburgh on Thursday night was news to him when a reporter called last week.
Since then, Yohance Paris has been trying to find answers to a number of questions, such as why his 21-year-old son was in Pittsburgh and what police know about the shooting.
Investigators have not released much information about the incident to the public.
What is known is that police and paramedics responded about 8:45 p.m. to Swope Street near the East Busway in Shadyside for a report of shots fired. There, they found Elijah Paris lying face down on the street with gunshot wounds to his head, neck, body and extremities.
He was pronounced dead at 8:52 p.m. The death was ruled a homicide by the Allegheny County medical examiner’s office.
Police have not said what Elijah Paris was doing in Shadyside when he was shot. He was living in Beechview, and a black BMW registered in his name was towed from the scene of the shooting.
No arrests have been made, and city police spokeswoman Sonya Toler said investigators have no leads.
Yohance Paris, 43, of New York City said investigators told him that they plan to review footage from a security camera near the scene of the shooting, but they did not have a chance to do so before the weekend.
He said he was surprised to learn that his son was in Pittsburgh. He said his son grew up a “country boy” in Yakima, Wash., a city of fewer than 95,000 people about 150 miles southeast of Seattle.
As a child, Elijah Paris excelled in academics, particularly in mathematics, according to his father. But he also had troubles and “tremendous instability from day one until now,” Yohance Paris said. Elijah was diagnosed with attention deficit disorder, his father said, and his heavy regimen of medication “made him worse.”
Elijah’s sister, Rayanna, was one of the most well-liked people in their school, Yohance Paris said.
“She was the ultra-popular girl in school, and he was the goofy kid with the popular sister,” he said. “He had friends, but he might [have been] the butt of jokes now and then.”
Yohance Paris said his separation from the twins’ mother was cordial, but he regrets his decision not to be involved in the lives of his children.
“I spent the last 19 years of my life unable to remove the picture of him and his sister sleeping in their bed the night I left,” he said.
Elijah Paris hit a growth spurt around age 15 and went from being “short” to 6 feet 3 inches or 6-4, according to his father.
“I don’t know if he changed his attitude from a meek and mild person to a braggadocious person,” Yohance Paris said. “He did change.”
He said he believes his son was in Pittsburgh to attend barber school or perhaps work a construction job. It’s unclear exactly how long Elijah Paris had been living in the city.
The younger Mr. Paris was charged by Fox Chapel police with several gun and drug offenses late last year.
On Dec. 27, according to a criminal complaint, Elijah Paris was found in the basement of a home on West Chapel Ridge Road in Fox Chapel with cocaine, marijuana, a scale and other drug paraphernalia. He also had a loaded handgun, the complaint said.
He was held for trial at his March 15 preliminary hearing but was out of jail on $7,500 bail.
Attorney Al Burke, who represented Elijah Paris, said he didn’t have much information because case findings are not presented until after the preliminary hearing.
It was unclear why Mr. Paris was in the Fox Chapel home. Residents of the home did not return a call seeking comment.
Yohance Paris was unaware of the charges against his son.
He said the last time he talked to his son was about a month ago.
The elder Mr. Paris said he’s remorseful that he didn’t talk to his son more over the years.
“When you’re not with your children, you’re not as complete and mature as you should be,” he said. “… There’s not a day that went by in the last 19 years that I didn’t regret [leaving] and thought about it.”
Andrew Goldstein: agoldstein@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1352.
First Published: April 10, 2017, 4:00 a.m.