truesee's Blog

SCOTT DAUGHERTY

Staff Writer

With his hand shoved in the right pocket of his black Columbia jacket, Josue Angel walked into a gas station-doughnut shop early one morning last December and demanded cash. He had a gun and wasn't afraid to use it, the El Salvadoran immigrant told the owner of the Laurel store.

To punctuate the threat, he punched the owner in the stomach.

At first, Mapher Ibrahimi, a 48-year-old married father of two, complied - he opened the register and let Angel fill his pockets.

But as Angel turned toward the door, Ibrahimi unzipped his black winter coat, pulled a .40 caliber Heckner & Koch semi-automatic from the holster on his hip and followed him outside.

This was the second robbery in three weeks at the store and the fourth in 17 months.

Outside, Ibrahimi yelled for Angel to stop.

According to police reports, Ibrahimi said Angel then turned in a "scary way."

The store owner opened fire - releasing a volley of six hollow-point bullets into the cold winter air.

A moment later, Angel, 29, of Laurel, was on the ground, bleeding from a single shot to his buttocks in a nearby parking lot. The man with an "Only god can judge me" tattoo across his chest died later that morning at the Prince George's County Trauma Center.

While Angel was apparently unarmed, running away and shot from behind, prosecutors decided earlier this year not to file charges in the Dec. 28 shooting. They also didn't take the case before a grand jury.

"The law is not crystal clear. One can make arguments for charging or for not charging," Deputy State's Attorney William Roessler said. "In the end, we felt the self-defense claim would ultimately prevail."

Despite the prosecutor's decision - which surprised legal experts contacted by The Capital - the case raises questions about what constitutes the line between self-defense and murder.

"It just doesn't look like self-defense to me," said George Harper, an attorney representing Angel's widow, Nancy Aldano. He plans to file a wrongful death lawsuit against Ibrahimi in the coming weeks.

"It looks like he chased him down and killed him," Harper said.

No alarm

When Angel walked up to the store at about 3:30 a.m. with his face partially shrouded by a blue scarf, Ibrahimi thought he was just another customer, according to a 54-page police report obtained by The Capital under the state's Public Information Act.

Outside the Dunkin' Donuts-Chevron station, the owner snuffed out his cigarette and followed Angel inside. He was greeted with a threat.

"Give me the money or I will (expletive) kill you," Angel said quietly enough that a clerk at the doughnut counter didn't hear him.

Mohamed L. Dieye and customer Stephen Koran said they didn't realize what was happening until Angel bolted out the door.

In an interview with police, Koran recalled Ibrahimi followed the robber outside and opened fire.

"As soon as he got out the door (he started shooting). It wasn't even a second," Koran said, according to a police recording. "I just thought he was a little reckless for shooting."

Bullets fly

What transpired outside the gas station on Route 198 not far from the Laurel Park race course was neither fully captured on video nor witnessed by Koran or Dieye. For details, police and prosecutors were forced to rely primarily on Ibrahimi's version of events.

According to Ibrahimi, he yelled for Angel to stop. In response, Angel spun around.

"He looked at me right away with his hand in his pocket. That scared me so much I shot the first shot," Ibrahimi told Detective Jason McNemar, explaining he thought Angel was turning around to shoot. "My estimate at that moment, I be dead."

Ibrahimi, a Jordanian immigrant, fired a total of six Federal-brand rounds as he chased Angel around the building. Five casings were found in front of the store and one was discovered around back, behind the Starting Gate Servicenter.

Ibrahimi told detectives he kept firing because Angel kept turning around toward him.

Only one of the shots connected with Angel, striking him in the right buttocks.

The bullet tore through his right femoral artery before exiting the front of his thigh. He ran for several hundred feet before collapsing in an adjacent parking lot, leaving a trail of blood behind him.

Dieye called 911. Dozens of county paramedics and police officers - including one who sold Ibrahimi his gun - descended on the gas station.

While paramedics transported Angel to the hospital, officers secured the scene with crime tape, covered bullet casings with cups and started interviewing witnesses.

From Angel, police recovered $94 in cash, a diamond ring, Timberland glasses, a Samsung digital camera and a pack of Ice Breakers gum.

Ibrahimi was taken to a police interview room in Crownsville, where he waited more than 90 minutes for detectives to return from the scene. He was read his Miranda rights, but spoke to detectives without an attorney.

Aggressor?

For prosecutors, the question of whether to charge Ibrahimi boiled down to what happened when he confronted Angel outside the store.

It didn't matter that Angel - an illegal immigrant with only traffic crimes on his record in Maryland - was trying to run away at the time of the shooting, Roessler said. Under his reading of state law, a store owner is allowed to pursue a thief and try to reclaim his property.

"The owner was under no obligation to remain in his store or to retreat," Roessler said.

He added that since Angel said in the store he had a gun, Ibrahimi was within his rights to use lethal force when he saw the man swing his arm around.

"If you believe the store owner, and we have nothing to contradict him, then he responded legally," said Roessler, stressing that he found Ibrahimi to be serious, candid, soft-spoken and "believable."

Harper, the attorney representing Angel's widow, disagrees. In a June 6 letter to the State's Attorney's Office, he argued Ibrahimi became the aggressor as soon as he left the store in pursuit of Angel.

"Once (Angel) had exited the store and begun his retreat, Mr. Ibrahimi had a duty to retreat," Harper wrote in the letter. "The peril was not so imminent that he could not safely retreat. He did not stand his ground to defend himself, he pursued."

To support his argument, he cited one of the standard instructions judges give jurors in cases involving claims of self-defense.

"Before using deadly force, the defendant is required to make all efforts to retreat," the jury instruction reads, according to Harper.

In an email, Harper went on to question Ibrahimi's account of what happened. Specifically, he noted the fact that Angel was shot in the rear.

Roessler agreed the location of the bullet wound raised some questions for his staff, but he said it did not mean Ibrahimi lied about Angel swinging his arm around in a threatening manner.

Ibrahimi declined to comment for this article, but his attorney stressed his client did nothing wrong.

"He was totally in the right. His reaction was wholly appropriate," said Peter O'Neill, arguing there was no guarantee Angel was not going to return and shoot Ibrahimi.

"It is a shame he had to die, but he put himself in that position," O'Neill said.

Questions persist

The decision not to pursue charges against Ibrahimi drew mixed reviews last week from several private attorneys contacted by The Capital.

Some argued prosecutors made the right choice; few jurors in the county would even consider convicting a shop owner for shooting a robber.

"The jury would probably carry him out (of the courtroom) on their shoulders," said veteran defense attorney and former prosecutor T. Joseph Touhey.

Others said the location of Angel's wound called for prosecutors to take action.

"I could certainly see a good argument for voluntary manslaughter. ... Just because you are a robbery victim, you don't get a pass to kill the robber," said David E. Aaronson, professor of law at the American University Washington College of Law and author of "Maryland Criminal Jury Instructions and Commentary."

"I think the state's attorney had an obligation to at least present it to a grand jury," said Andrew D. Levy, a Baltimore defense attorney and adjunct professor at the University of Maryland School of Law. "It's not that I think a jury would definitely convict, but they certainly could have."

Harper and Aaronson questioned what message the State's Attorney's Office sent to the community by not filing charges.

"Vigilante justice should not be sanctioned by the state legal system," Harper said.

Roessler countered that the job of a prosecutor is only to consider the facts of a particular case and how they relate to Maryland law. They can't make decisions based on how the public might interpret them, he said.

Plus, he added, such an argument can go both ways.

"If we prosecuted (Ibrahimi), then we might be sending a message that store owners can't defend themselves and that store owners are free targets in Anne Arundel County," Roessler said.

 

Nelson Santiago, 30, of Hollywood, was arrested after an employee with Continental Airlines saw him slip an I-Pad computer out of a suitcase and into his pants on Monday, said Dani Moschella, spokeswoman for Broward Sheriff’s Office.

Santiago has been charged with two counts of grand theft. He was released from jail on Tuesday, according to a report released on Thursday.

An investigation by detectives lead them to find Santiago responsible for a string of similar thefts during the past six months.

He told investigators he stole computers, GPS devices and video cameras from suitcases he was screening during his shift at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport’s Terminal 1. The terminal houses Continental and Southwest airlines.

Santiago would immediately take a photo of the stolen item with his cell phone, post it for sale online and often sell it by the time his shift ended.

The 30-year-old man has been a Transportation Security Administration officer since January 2009, but he does not work for the agency any more.

The Broward Sheriff’s Office is continuing their investigation with the Transportation Security Administration.

More charges on Santiago are pending.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finally, A Seattle attorney offered to help. Last week, Felix Luna sent Chase a scathing letter.