LAWRENCE, Mass. (AP) – A grand jury Wednesday indicted a decorated Marine sergeant who served in Iraq on charges he fired a shotgun into a noisy crowd below his window, injuring two people.

Daniel Cotnoir, 33, was charged with two counts of assault and battery by means of a dangerous weapon and one count of discharging a shotgun within 500 feet of a building, according to the Essex County district attorney’s office.

Cotnoir pleaded innocent in September to allegations that he pointed a 12-gauge shotgun out the window of his second-floor apartment and fired a single shot at a crowd leaving nearby nightclubs at 2:30 a.m. on Aug. 13.

Fragments struck and injured Lisette Cumba, 15, and Kelvin Castillo, 20, both of Lowell, Mass.

Cotnoir, a married father of two, told police he feared for the safety of his family after someone threw an empty juice bottle through his bedroom window.

The Marine Corps Times named Cotnoir the “Marine of the Year” in July. A mortician by trade, he prepared the bodies of dead U.S. soldiers in Iraq for burial.

After a 10-month tour in Iraq , Cotnoir returned home in November 2004. He and his father, Daniel Cotnoir, operate the Racicot Funeral Home in Lawrence, about 30 miles north of Boston.

Cotnoir is free on $5,000 cash bail. He is scheduled to be arraigned in Salem Superior Court in the next two weeks.