Clayton man charged with firing at neighbor

A Clayton man fired a gun at his neighbor and tried to flee in a taxi Tuesday evening, police said.

Tracy House, 33, told police that he heard a disturbance in the backyard of his Durham Street house around 7 p.m. When House went outside, a man – identified by police as Michael Anthony Ingrassia, 44, of 305 Durham St. – darted out of the bushes.

House chased the man into the 10000 block of Business 70 until he pulled out a handgun and fired several times toward House, police said. No one was injured.

State troopers getting out of their patrol car at a local restaurant heard the gunshots and saw Ingrassia getting into a taxicab, police said.

Troopers stopped the cab at Business 70 and South Barbour Street and arrested Ingrassia. Police said they found a .357-caliber handgun in the cab.

Ingrassia was charged with assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill and possession of a firearm by a felon. He was also served with an outstanding 2006 warrant from Wake County for unauthorized use of a motor vehicle.

He was placed in the Johnston County jail under an $80,500 secured bond.

Ingrassia was convicted of assault on a female and resisting an officer in Wake County in 2007, according to state Department of Correction records.