As Derrick Ponds and Antoine Dade were fighting with one another in front of Dade’s Memorial Avenue home about noon Monday, a loaded handgun, which turned out to be stolen, “fell from Ponds’ possession,” city police Agent Jeremy Brown wrote in an affidavit.

The two men then began struggling to get control of the gun, Brown said.

When Ponds, 31, was finally able to get a hold of the weapon, he began striking the right side of Dade’s face with it, causing “the gun to discharge,” Brown said.

“The round traveled over Dade’s head, through a glass storm door and landed in a couch” at 1055 Memorial Avenue, Brown said.

Dade shoved Ponds and went inside his house while Ponds bolted to his home at 609 Second Ave., Brown said. Ponds is the stepfather of Dade’s son and the two got into a heated argument that turned physical, Brown said, adding the two were arguing about how to raise the child.

Ponds, a convicted drug dealer, was taken into custody at his home without incident. He directed officers to a back porch in the 800 block of Memorial Avenue, where they recovered the handgun, which he had ditched. The gun was reported stolen to city police in mid-May, Brown said.

Following his arraignment before District Judge Christian Frey on charges of aggravated and simple assault, recklessly endangering, convicted felon not to possess a firearm and receiving stolen property, Ponds was committed to the Lycoming County Prison in lieu of $95,000 bail.