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Posted on 04/20/2012 4:37:06 PM PDT by CharlesMartelsGhost
Ten-year-old Abdifatah Mohamud was running for his life down Sycamore Street at about 5 p.m. Tuesday when a concerned neighbor stopped to try to help.
Seeing the boy's stepfather chasing after him, the neighbor helped the man, Ali Mohamed Mohamud, catch up with the child.
The boy didn't want to go home with Mohamud.
"I told the boy, 'Daddy promises nothing is going to happen,'" the neighbor later told The Buffalo News.
"The boy said to me: 'No, he always says that.'"
Less than six hours later, Abdifatah was dead, brutally beaten, and his stepfather, Ali Mohamed Mohamud, was under arrest.
The boy was tied to a chair with duct tape, a sock stuffed in his mouth, and he was beaten with a stick or blunt object in the basement of their Guilford Street home, near the Broadway Market, authorities said.
The stepfather was angry because the boy, a fifth-grader at the International Preparatory School on Clinton Street, had fallen behind in his homework, law enforcement officials said.
The neighbor, a mother of young children, sobbed as she recalled how she intervened, persuading the boy to go with his stepfather and even driving them back to their house.
"Your daddy says everything will be OK," the neighbor recalled telling the boy, asking that her name not be published. "I may have been the last person to see that little boy alive."
During the short ride home, she said, the stepfather offered repeated assurances that Abdifatah would be fine.
"I told the boy, 'You go home, and if something does happen, you let me know tomorrow morning,'" the neighbor said.
Mohamud, 40, a native of Somalia who has been in the United States for a decade, was charged with second-degree murder. Police investigators were shocked over the viciousness of the beating, according to Buffalo Police Commissioner Daniel Derenda, who struggled Wednesday to find words to comment on the case.
"Every homicide is bad, but it is particularly hard to deal with for first responders, police and others, when it is a 10-year-old child," Derenda said. "In talking to investigators, I was told it was one of the most grisly crime scenes that they can remember, and some have been here 40 years."
Erie County Assistant District Attorney Thomas M. Finnerty, at Mohamud's arraignment Wednesday, told City Judge Diane Wray that Mohamud admitted beating his stepson to death.
"The defendant admitted he tied up his 10-year-old stepson, admitted that he put a sock in his mouth, put duct tape over the mouth and beat him to death with a stick or similar blunt object," Finnerty said.
Ferry Fillmore District Police Officer Christopher Fields, responding to a call from the boy's mother of a missing person, entered 30 Guilford St. at about 10:40 p.m. Tuesday and searched the house.
In the basement, he found the child's body, partially hidden under a blanket.
Mohamud, a security guard who is employed by U.S. Security Associates and worked at The Buffalo News, fled from the house in a red Subaru Forester and called his work supervisor, asking him to meet him at the newspaper.
The supervisor tried to find out what was wrong during the phone call, but Mohamud refused to say, according to a report the supervisor later filed.
At 11 p.m., the two met at the newspaper, and Mohamud confessed to the killing, according to the supervisor's report.
"I have a lot of problems and killed one of my kids," Mohamud told the supervisor, according to his report.
Mohamud had come to The News to remove his possessions from his work locker, the supervisor reported.
Police in the area spotted Mohamud's vehicle parked near The News building and approached the Scott Street entrance.
The supervisor told police that Mohamud was in the building and led them to him in the locker room. Mohamud then stood up, and police handcuffed him.
At Buffalo Police Headquarters, Mohamud cooperated with Detective Sgt. James Lonergan and provided police with a statement "indicating his involvement in the death of his stepson," Detective Chief Dennis J. Richards said.
But none of this could comfort the neighbor who had tried to help the boy she spotted running down Sycamore with his school knapsack.
"It wasn't normal," the neighbor recounted. "I was trying to pull over, but there was traffic behind me. Then I saw his father on the other side of Sycamore. He was running after him and trying to stop cars to get across the street and catch him."
When the traffic had finally passed her eastbound car on Sycamore, she swung around and drove up to the stepfather, heading toward Jefferson Avenue.
"I asked, 'What's going on?' and he said his son was running away and he was trying to catch him. He asked if I would give him a ride, and I did. He said he didn't want anything to happen to him.
"We spotted the boy on Jefferson, and he was trying to jump over a fence. The father got out of the car and held him by the hand. The boy said to me he wanted to go to a family member's house on Auburn Avenue.
"He said: 'I don't want to go back with him.' He would not sit in the back seat of the car with his father. He said he wanted to sit in [the] front seat next to me. I told him, 'You come home with me and we'll wait for your mother, or if you have the phone number, we'll call your family on Auburn.'"
At that point, the neighbor, an immigrant from Africa like the Mohamuds, said the boy calmed down a little.
By 5:20 p.m., she said, she had pulled up in front of the boy's house, and the stepfather and boy went inside.
The neighbor sobbed Wednesday recounting the episode.
Mohamud is married to the boy's mother, Shukri, and both have children from previous relationships for a total of six children, according to police, neighbors and acquaintances.
Richards declined to comment on a motive, but neighbors said the father could be very strict, especially when it came to the youngsters doing their homework.
"The father wanted him to study and study. He told me, 'I check his homework every night, and his grades are going down,'" said Tariq Butt, whose family watched Abdifatah's two younger siblings after their brother's body was discovered.
Butt, an acquaintance of the Mohamud family, said the stepfather had confided in him that he was upset with Abdifatah for falling behind in his homework.
"I always had this feeling that the father was strict," Butt said, and added that Abdifatah was a well-behaved youngster.
Back on Guilford Street, as neighbors congregated throughout the day to discuss the death, Johnny Alexander, a longtime Guilford resident, offered this explanation for a killing that defied logic:
"You just never know what's going on in people's homes."
Mohamud is scheduled to return to City Court at 2 p.m. Monday for further proceedings. In the meantime, he is being held without bail in the Erie County Holding Center.
they're not normal...
isn't there something from the Bible, about how there was a separation between Israel and Ischmael?....that Ischamel is supposed to be the foundation of muslims, and that is why they are so screwed up, that this is indeed a punishment from God?...
anyway, i heard something about that....
I guess my story about Ischmael was not correct...his brother was Issac, not Israel....fwiw
“I have a lot of problems and killed one of my kids,” Mohamud told the supervisor, according to his report.”
Oy freaking veh.
That poor woman, my heart goes out to her.
If I am ever in a similar situation I will take the child and call the cops.
Sorry if that screws up anybody’s life, but I will err on that side of caution.
I might have done differently before I read this story, but if it is any person not known to me, that is what I will do.
My father was a child welfare worker in NYC in the 1970s.
This “father” should be shot.
Just killing the kids americans won’t kill.
Thanks US Gov’t for bringing the scum of the earth to our shores, without fear or favor.
What an infuriating story.
“Otherwise I suspect I might have been killed by my own mother.”
I’m sorry about your mom. My mom was a pretty negative person too, although not physically violent.
hispanics are one thing...but at least they have cultural roots in large parts of the southwest....
but why somalians?...they don't fit in here ...everywhere they go there seems to be horrible crime.
“What too many people do not realize is that what happened to that boy was a commonplace occurrence in virtually all places and times prior to the so-called modern era...”
I really don’t think that is accurate. Kids being beaten, yes, maybe. Certainly more common than nowadays.
But, beaten to death? BEATEN TO DEATH? Over homework, or missed chores, etc.
No, I really don’t think too many children have been beaten to death over this stuff. Ever, even in Somalia or the rest of the Islamic world.
If what you say is true we would either have 1. a lot less people than we do today and/or 2. a much better behaved populace.
Bucking Fastard!
The horror, the horror.
Last year, I read the “Heaven Is For Real” book, which was the big seller recounting the recollections of young Colton Burpo.
I was particularly stuck by one element recounted in a blog: http://desertspor.blogspot.com/2011/11/jesus-loves-children.html — this is not my blog — it just summarizes my feelings very well as they relate to this butchery in Buffalo, so put the rifle down, HumbleGunner.
These aren’t my words, but I would be proud if they were.
Start Excerpt:
I recently read Heaven is for Real. This is a bestseller about a little boy’s experiences. He almost died and had an emergency appendectomy. The doctors didn’t expect him to live. He made a miraculous recovery. Then, months later casually mentioned to his parents about some of his experiences in heaven during the surgery. Further questioning over time revealed more and more information that led his parents to believe the experience was genuine....
I think the main messages that the family is trying to share are that heaven is real, God loves you, and Jesus loves the children.
It was the last one that struck me especially, and the reason I am writing.... The author says his son mentioned that over and over. “Dad, Jesus wants you to know that He loves the children.” “Dad, Jesus says He really, really loves the children.” I keep thinking on that. I think that is a message God would emphasize. Remembering that helps my perspective.”
End Excerpt
Young Mr. Burpo, I hear you, and I understand.
There is a lot of talk about Islam. A lot of the common perspectives will no doubt be expressed in this thread. I wish to leave aside my personal agreement or disagreement with these perspectives.
I believe Colton Burpo’s report on his encounter with Jesus. I think that people collectively have special responsibility for the protection of children. I would like to offer this:
If we, as a nation, are to pass judgment on individuals or groups based on their actions and/or philosophies, I would be comfortable if the benchmark we were to use was this: How were children impacted?
And further, as far as actions to be taken, I ask, given that Jesus loves the children beyond all else, What Would Jesus have us Do?
I understand the Bible teaches that Vengeance is not to be Man’s, but God’s. I am certainly not looking for a biblical discussion; I claim no particular expertise.
But I do feel that there is a special responsibility to love the children, and therefore offer, using this judgmental benchmark across humanity, what actions can best represent Jesus, knowing that He really, really loves the children.
I apologize for such a long post. I apologize if it makes no sense, or if it is overly dramatic. I apologize if it is filled with typos, but my hands are nearly shaking from what happened in this story, and I feel so infinitely badly for that child.
May that poor child find his peace with Jesus — Jesus loved him — I do not care about the child’s religious faith — he was a child — he is with Jesus.
May God help us all.
There is a group in most prisons called the Aryan Nation - they are brutal savages and will take care of the step dad.
ROP alert....ain’t multiculturalism grand?/s
Step parents and non-related BF are right behind mothers as the most likely to kill/molest children living with them, at least according to FBI statistics. I wish mothers would think about that before they decide to go all “eat, pray, love” and take off with the kids with their new man. The safest place for most kids is with their biological father, but you would never know that from the way they treat fathers in family court.
And have the taxpayers finance what will end up being a comfortable life? Oh, hell no. Pig-blood - dipped bullet to the back of his head.
Rule 1- muzzies lie.
Rule 2- see rule 1.
Ahhh...the wonderful tapestry and enriching quality of other cultures.
I pity the poor woman who intervened. There won’t be a day in her life when she doesn’t pause to think “If I had only...”
bump for under-noticed story
I’m wondering where the wonderful “Child Protective” Services is in all of this? Sounds like this wasn’t an isolated event.
Oh wait. I forgot. Child Protective Services is merely a tool for vindictive Western ex-wives to get back at their ex-husbands should said ex-husband DARE to move on after the divorce (even though it’s usually the WIFE who initiates the divorce). Fighting REAL child abuse is FAR too dangerous and politically incorrect.
Just ask my husband’s ex-wife; a CPS worker herself; turning us in for “age inappropriate work” because we had the children (all over the age of five) empty three waste paper baskets and pick up twigs for 25 minutes straight in the backyard. And yes she used her influence as a CPS worker to get hubby on the NYS Child Abuse and Maltreatment register without a fair hearing or a report to us due to a “CLERICAL error” (nudge nudge, wink wink)
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