BRADY TWP — A Slippery Rock teenager admitted that he fired a pellet gun toward a group of children but that he did not deliberately try to hit anyone, state police said.

A 5-year-old boy, however, was struck in the arm May 12 while attending a birthday party at the home in Brady Township and required hospital treatment.

Police on Tuesday charged Christopher B. Carr, 18, with misdemeanor counts of simple assault and reckless endangerment, and a summary count of discharging an air rifle in a public place.

The case stems from an incident about 4:30 p.m. during a birthday party in the backyard of a home on Muddy Creek Drive.

The victim, who lives in Prospect, was hit “out of nowhere” in the lower arm with a pellet, according to investigators.

The boy was taken by private vehicle to Butler Memorial Hospital for treatment of injuries not considered serious.

Police later that night determined that three 17-year-old boys had been shooting pellet guns from a nearby home on Route 8 across the highway, court documents said, “without a properly constructed target range.”

Carr, investigators said, also had been with the boys shooting pellet guns but he subsequently left. Police seized a pellet pistol, a pump pellet gun and a high-powered, scoped pellet gun from the home.

They also found two containers of .177-caliber pellets.

Police on May 13 spoke to Carr, who acknowledged he was shooting the guns with the boys.

He said that about 4:30 p.m. before leaving for work he fired a single round with a pellet gun with a scope toward a group of children across the street.

He told police that he “saw them in the scope and fired over their heads,” documents said, but did not intentionally try to hit the children. He allegedly conceded he was reckless.

“Carr further said he was not aware he injured someone,” according to a police affidavit, “and apologized for his actions.”

Police said they cited the three boys for discharging an air rifle in a public place.