Michigan gas station clerk saves teen from alleged kidnapper after she whispers ‘help’ | Michigan
A gas station clerk who came to the defense of a suburban Detroit girl when she walked into his store and uttered the word “help” eventually played a role in rescuing the teenager after a stranger kidnapped her at gunpoint on her way to school, according to authorities.
“I believe this can happen [gone] much worse than it was.” in question Police Chief Hussein Farhat of Hamtramck, Michigan, at a news conference addressing a rescue attributed in part to convenience store worker Abdulrahman Abohatem. “We have every confidence that this could end really badly.”
As first reported by Michigan news outlet WXYZThe 16-year-old girl at the center of the case was waiting for a school bus in Hamtramck to take her to classes at Frontier International Academy on the morning of April 13 when an armed man she did not know kidnapped her.
Targeting the girl at random, the man eventually brought her to a Sunoco gas station near Detroit, where Abohatem worked as a clerk. Abohatem later told WXYZ that he became suspicious after the man asked the girl for money for cigarettes.
Abohatem told the station: “Then he called out to me… as if silently, ‘Help me.’ He said he came out from behind the protective glass of the front counter, got between the man and the girl, and ordered her to stop working.
Some fellow students who witnessed the girl’s abduction managed to locate the victim’s mobile phone. They gave that information to police, and officers arrived at Sunoco just as Abohatem was escorting the man he allegedly kidnapped out of his store.
When he saw police, Abohatem instinctively pointed to the man he had kicked out of the store and told officers, “That’s that guy,” he recalled to WXYZ.
Officers quickly arrested the man Hamtramck police were looking for. defined He stars as Donald Fields, a 48-year-old registered sex offender. Prosecutors charged Fields with criminal sexual conduct, kidnapping, illegal weapon possession, aggravated assault and habitual offender, police said, without elaborating.
Police said a judge ordered Fields held without bail.
Meanwhile, the girl was later reunited with her family at her home.
Statement from the Border in question The school said it was grateful that its student victim was “safely rescued” and that the suspect was quickly arrested, but said it understood “how worrying situations like this can be for families and the wider community.”
At a press conference on Thursday, Farhat said it was “heroic” that the victim received vital help from fellow students and Abohatem.
Hamtramck Mayor Adam Alharbi added: “This rescue was a testament to the vigilance of our community.” Alharbi also said he wanted to “personally praise the victim for her incredible courage in seeking help.”
As for Abohatem, Arab American News He wrote that members of the Yemeni American community in and around Detroit were rallying support for him as he reportedly prepared for his upcoming wedding.
Abohatem himself told WXYZ it “feels good” [to] save someone”.
He also stated: “Sixteen years – that [a] child.”
