From ARLnow:
Police: Store Employee Charged After Shooting Would-Be Thief
An employee of a local shop is facing charges after police say he shot someone breaking into the store.
The incident happened Sunday morning in the Green Valley neighborhood, shortly before 5 a.m.
Nothing good happens after midnight.
Police say a group of three suspects broke into a store on the 2400 block of Shirlington Road and began stealing cash and merchandise. The employee, who was in a backroom at the time, picked up a gun, opened a door into the store, and shot one of the suspects, according to an Arlington County Police press release.
One of the suspects, a boy under 18 years of age, was struck and suffered serious but non-life-threatening injuries, police said.
To Zuber’s surprise, police and the Commonwealth’s Attorney decided to level felony charges against Abushariah that could land him in prison for upwards of two decades, if convicted. Abushariah was denied bond, Zuber said, leading to concerns for his health while confined during the coronavirus epidemic.
“Following consultation with the Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office, the employee, Hamzeh Abushariah, 33, of Washington D.C. was charged with Malicious Wounding, Reckless Handling of a Firearm and Violation of a Protective Order,” police said. “Additional charges related to the breaking and entering are anticipated at a later date.”
Three guys loot a store and they don’t get arrested and held without bond. The employee who shot at them in self-defense gets held without bond.
Here is the detail that I think the prosecutor is hanging his hat on:
The employee then retreated, before going back into the store and firing another shot, police said.
This seems flimsy to me, especially given this next part.
Zuber claimed that police asked Abushariah, “why didn’t you run out the back door?”
The prosecutor is stating that there are additional details that justify this prosecution.
“There’s evidence we are not at liberty to share that support the charges, the decision was not made lightly,” the office said on Twitter.
Additional news reports give this information.
Aqrawi says he bought two firearms a few weeks ago because he was concerned someone would try to steal from his store during the coronavirus pandemic.
“We bought protection for the store just in case, because on Facebook you see a lot of robberies, a lot of things going on,” Aqrawi said.
Aqrawi says Abushariah is a father of two children (who were not at the store at the time). He says Abushariah was staying at the store both to save money and to avoid the coronavirus, which had affected the complex Abushariah lived in in DC.
This leads me to two competing thoughts.
One the one hand, there might be additional details that really do make Abushariah guilty of these crimes.
On the other hand, it might be that the very Leftist prosecutor is trying to make an example out of this clerk and business owner. That in Blue Virginia, if you panic buy a gun to protect yourself during a crisis from some punks who want to loot your shop, you shouldn’t be able to defend yourself from criminals.
I won’t pass judgment just yet, but this is definitely one to watch.
“Hamzeh Abushariah… was charged with … Violation of a Protective Order…”
Violation of a Protective Order may be part of the additional but unspecified details leading to prosecution. Definitely one to watch.
If he were living at the store, wouldn’t that be his domicile; much as an RV is when living in it? Is there a Castle Doctrine in his state?
He was subject to a domestic violence restraining order, meaning that he was a prohibited person. I am sure the answer lies there.
Bet your right.
And if i was in the jury.
NOT GUILTY!
Bet i know about the Thugs too
Reason: Virginia Man Shoots an Active Robber in Store, Is Arrested Himself.
https://reason.com/2020/04/01/virginia-man-shoots-an-active-robber-in-store-is-arrested-himself/
According to the article the shooter was given the firearm by how boss but it looks like the shooter was a prohibited person.
Virginia law does not allow for brandishing or using a firearm for defense of property. If the smash and grabs made no move to threaten or move towards the shooter, then the shooter isn’t allowed to use that firearm.
In addition, in my opinion, if the store employee had attempted to use other means to stop the robbery any threat arising from those actions would have invalidated the use of a firearm.
In other words, when seconds count the police aren’t coming. Just watch your property be destroyed and taken.
Welcome to Virginia.
According to the story I read, here’s what happened:
The burglars broke into the store. The clerk, who was sleeping in a separate, “secure” part of the building, entered the sales floor to investigate the noise, and discovered three offenders burglarizing the store. There is no evidence that the burglars confronted him, threatened him, assaulted him, or even knew he was there, but he shot one of them anyway. The clerk then retreated back to his place of safety, then returned and fired on the burglars as they were fleeing.
If the facts as given are true and complete, the clerk was never in imminent danger and there was no lawful justification for either shooting.
Several stories have called the offenders “robbers.” They weren’t, they were burglars, and the difference is crucial. Robbery is a crime of violence and a victim of a robbery can defend himself with deadly force. Burglary is a property crime and the victim generally cannot. There is no evidence that the clerk was in imminent danger in the first shooting, and shooting them while they were fleeing is always illegal.
I think you should save your sympathy for someone who deserves it.
Sorry, my friend, but my sympathies will never lie with criminals who are destroying the livelihood of others. If the store owner is insured, then the bite is just transferred to a nibble out of everyone’s hide. The criminals are still parasites.
Whether or not one should sympathize with the store owner or the employee, is a separate question.
Boris, you misunderstood me. I didn’t mean you should sympathize with the burglars. I meant you should not waste sympathy on people who don’t bother to know the law, break it, and then cry about getting arrested. This story has bad guys (the burglars), stupid guys (the clerk), and apparently, either stupid or dishonest guys (the reporters and headline writers who consistently called the burglars “robbers”). There’s no one to sympathize with here.
The principle of “nullification” says that bad laws should not stand.
It seems to me we’re dealing with an example here. Yes, in recent times politicians have put in place laws that authorize deadly force only against threats of death or grave injury. In more civilized times, deadly force was also authorized and routinely used against major property crimes, and it’s about time we returned to that policy.
So yes, the store owner might be in the wrong by the letter of the law as written. But a jury of his peers ought to issue a verdict of “not guilty”.
I think that there is enough blame to go around here. Unfortunately, no matter how you cut it, the store owner and employee were the people that were going to get hurt.
Bad guys decide to take what does not belong to them.
Store owner via his employee steps up to stop them with a firearm.
Employee holds bad guys at gun point until police arrive.
Employee goes to jail for brandishing a firearm during a burglary, there was no threat to employee.
Bad guys decide to take what does not belong to them.
Store owner via his employee steps up to stop them without a firearm.
Bad guys decide to attack employee.
Employee deploys firearm and shoots.
Employee goes to jail because he is the person responsible for escalating the situation from a burglary to a robbery with violence.
Bad guys decide to take what does not belong to them.
Store owner via his employee calls cops.
Cops say “Take notes and we’ll issue a summons when the emergency is over”
In every case, as long as the bad guys do not threaten the employee they get away with taking what doesn’t belong to them.
In the case in point things are even worse. The employee seems to have been a prohibited person. Which just goes to tell me that there are too many ways to loose your 2A rights. The store owner could be in trouble for giving a firearm to a prohibited person.
In addition, the firing on the bad guys, retreating and then re-engaging all leads to a bad shoot. The wonders of new gun owners who don’t know the laws they operate under, just assuming they have the right to defend themselves and their property with deadly force.