Nope, that just doesn't work for me.
Posted on 04/17/2004 11:34:29 PM PDT by jordan8
1 killed, 4 others injured; acts considered 'deliberate'
By THOMASI MCDONALD, MARTHA QUILLIN AND JENNIFER BREVORKA, Staff Writers
FAYETTEVILLE -- A man wearing only boxer shorts and a white T-shirt used a stolen van and pickup to hunt pedestrians in three counties Wednesday morning, running down five and killing one, according to authorities. Fuquay-Varina police later arrested Abdullah El-Amin Shareef, 25, whose last known address was 212 Guinevere Court in Winston-Salem, in a truck they said he took from a victim.
In the wake of the rampage were wrecked vehicles and people.
Lonel Bass, 56, died after being pinned under a stolen city of Fayetteville maintenance van in Cumberland County. Gary Lee Weller, 55, who was struck earlier in Fayetteville, was flown to UNC-Chapel Hill Hospitals with injuries that were life-threatening, the state Highway Patrol reported.
"The acts were deliberate, but we do not think he knew any of the people he hit," said Lt. Katherine Bryant, a Fayetteville Police Department spokeswoman. "He may have been greatly disturbed."
Shareef, reared in Raeford, has a record of convictions: one count each of driving while impaired and driving without a license, according to the Highway Patrol. This year, he was convicted in Forsyth County of misdemeanor assault on a government official, resisting an officer and attempted larceny, said C.E. Phillips, a Winston-Salem Police Department records employee.
On Wednesday, Cumberland County authorities charged Shareef with three counts of assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury with intent to kill. Bass' death is the subject of a homicide investigation.
Suspect was 'troubled'
A longtime family friend working Wednesday afternoon at the suspect's boyhood home in Raeford described Shareef, who is one of four children, as smart but docile and someone who was close to his mother. His mother, Pauline Shareef, died two months ago after a long illness, said Ahmad Abdurraheem, a painting contractor who lives in Raeford.
Abdurraheem said he last saw Shareef several weeks ago.
"I told my daughter, 'Abdullah is troubled,' " Abdurraheem said. "The last time I saw him he was distant. Troubled."
Wednesday's trouble began at 7:52 a.m. when Fayetteville police received a report of a city van stolen from a maintenance yard near downtown. Six minutes later, police received a report of an armed robbery involving the van at 3908 Naples St., according to a news release.
Police found no robbery, but the van had struck David McCaskill, 65, who was walking his dogs on a grassy slope on Naples Street in North Fayetteville.
McCaskill, reached at his home after treatment at Cape Fear Valley Medical Center, said he was taking his Shih Tzu and miniature pinscher for a stroll when he heard an engine behind him.
"When I turn, he guns it and comes straight towards me," McCaskill said.
Pulling his dogs close, McCaskill said he tried to jump out of the van's path, but the left side of the vehicle broke his right leg. "My whole foot was dangling," McCaskill said.
As he dragged himself up a knoll, the driver threw the van into reverse, trying to hit McCaskill again.
"He missed me," McCaskill said. "He stopped again and went forward, trying to hit me again."
After missing McCaskill in the third attempt, the driver stopped the van, got out and started beating McCaskill.
McCaskill, who lives nearby on Daytona Road, said he protected his face with his hands, while screaming and asking the man, "Why are you trying to kill me?"
Neighbors found McCaskill lying, his face bloody, in a clump of azalea bushes, said Stephen Renner, a Pope Air Force Base A-10 pilot who ran to his neighbor's aid with a loaded .22-caliber rifle.
At 8:08 a.m., police answered a call about a second hit-and-run and found Weller lying near Ramsey and Summerchase streets. Weller was in critical condition Wednesday afternoon at UNC, Burgess said.
Mark Mabe, Weller's neighbor and former co-worker, said Weller had been jogging when the van struck him. The van attack broke Weller's legs, crushed his hip and injured his pelvis and several ribs, Mabe said friends told him.
A health-conscious former football coach at Pine Forest High School, Weller had dropped off his car to be serviced Wednesday before his daily run, Mabe said. The white van sped through oncoming traffic before slamming into Weller, Mabe said.
The van went 30 feet off the road to hit Weller, said Capt. Greg Hayes, a spokesman for the Highway Patrol.
Less than 15 minutes later, the van hit Robert Fortier as he walked along Ramsey Street at the intersection with Bienville Drive. Fortier was taken to Cape Fear medical center with injuries that were not life-threatening.
The van continued north on Ramsey and was seen on U.S. 401 heading toward N.C. 217, the area where Bass died.
Pinned under the van
Bass was killed at 6899 Loop Road in North Cumberland County near Linden. Cumberland County sheriff's deputies found Bass pinned beneath the van about 9:40 a.m., said sheriff's Lt. G.L. Mobley.
Bass was pronounced dead at Cape Fear medical center, police reported.
Investigators think Shareef stole Bass' 1997 Chevrolet pickup, said Hayes, the Highway Patrol spokesman.
The fifth victim, Seth Thompson, was struck about 8:50 a.m. while feeding dogs at his father-in-law's home on N.C. 217 and suffered minor injuries.
Moments after being hit, Thompson jumped into an automobile, followed the truck toward Erwin and called police at 8:57 a.m. to report its license plate number, said Maj. Gary McNeill of the Harnett County Sheriff's Office.
Thompson lost sight of the truck before deputies could reach the area, McNeill said.
The pickup was sighted in nearby Dunn and reappeared in Fuquay-Varina, where it struck another vehicle after 10 a.m. and landed in a ditch, authorities reported.
When police arrived, Shareef fled and was tackled in nearby woods at 10:16 a.m., Fuquay-Varina police and the Highway Patrol reported.
After Shareef was returned to Fayetteville, he refused to talk to police. Sgt. W.A. Burgess said Wednesday that officers had to fingerprint him in an effort to learn his identity.
He was to be taken to Raleigh's Dorothea Dix mental hospital for evaluation, Fayetteville police said Wednesday night.
"That's the opposite of the boy I knew who grew up around here," Abdurraheem said.
Aye-men Bro!
Nope, that just doesn't work for me.
Thompson's been cited for impeded operation: using cellphone while driving, speeding, and operating to endanger.
Shareef will get 200 hrs community service cleaning Department of Public Works trucks and heavy machinery.
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