LEWISTON — A local man shot in the shoulder who is charged with robbery claims the shooter shouted: “Make America great again!”
Abdulahi Abdi, 27, appeared in 8th District Court on Monday for an initial appearance. At one point, he pulled back his blue jail-issued shirt to reveal a blood-stained bandage near his left shoulder. He said doctors at the Central Maine Medical Center emergency room had left the bullet in place when he was checked out Friday night.
Active-Retired Judge Joseph Field set Abdi’s cash bail at $20,000 or $50,000 in real estate as collateral.
Police said Abdi and the shooter gave conflicting accounts of the incident that happened after 10 p.m. Friday at 56 Birch St.
Michael Hensler, 27, told police he had gone to the store to buy cigarettes for his girlfriend, but found it was closed. On his return trip, he encountered at the corner of Blake and Birch streets two Somali men. He described them for police.
He said he tried to go around the men, excusing himself, when they started following him and yelling at him. They screamed epithets at Hensler and threatened to kill him, he told police.
He was afraid and asked them to leave him alone, he told police after he was read his rights.
They continued to follow him and scream at him, which is when he pulled out a handgun and fired it into the ground, he said.
The two men followed him into his building to where there was a locked door. He pressed a buzzer for the door to open, but no one responded.
He struggled with the two men and they grabbed his wallet and ripped it off the chain that attached it to his pants. He again pulled his .22-caliber handgun and fired it three times.
Police wrote in an affidavit that Hensler had a hard time remembering exactly where in the entryway of his apartment building he was when he fired the shots.
He told police the two men used the terms “cracker” and “honky” and he feared for his life.
He said one of the two men, believing it to be Abdi, pulled a knife and put it to his neck. The men beat him, punching him, he said.
An upstairs neighbor interrupted the apparent brawl and yelled at the two men to leave.
After one of the two men retrieved his jacket, the two left the building, she told police.
Hensler turned over his gun, which he had disassembled to three pieces, to police when they arrived at the scene. Four rounds had been fired, police said.
Hensler had scratch marks on the left side of his neck and stomach and there was swelling on his hands and knuckles.
The upstairs neighbor told police she had seen a black man in the street screaming, “B****” and walking toward her building. After running down the stairs, she saw two black men beating someone hunched over in the front entrance.
They yelled at the man they were beating: “B****, you are going to die! I am going to kill you!”
Surveillance cameras in the area captured video of two black men walking across Birch Street. Their clothes matched descriptions given by Hensler and his neighbor. The two men can be seen following Hensler into the brick enclosed yard of his apartment building, police said,
“The video does appear to corroborate Hensler’s account of the incident,” Detective Danielle Murphy wrote in her affidavit in support of Abdi’s arrest.
Hensler identified Abdi from a photo lineup.
Police recovered a piece of lead consistent with a .22-caliber round on the floor just inside the interior entry door, Murphy wrote. She also found a droplet of blood near the exterior wall, she wrote.
When interviewed by police at the emergency room and later at the police station after he was warned of his rights, Abdi said he had been walking in the area of Speakers Market, on Spruce Street near Park Street, when someone yelled: “Make America great again!” then shot him.
He said he hadn’t realized he’d been shot until later that night when he was with a friend on Maple Street and noticed a hole in his sweater and shirt and discovered he was bleeding. He walked to the hospital alone to have it looked at, he said.
Surveillance video of Spruce Street didn’t show Abdi had been in that area when he said he had been.
He told police he had been drinking all day, “all over.”
When police told Abdi they knew he had been on Birch Street that night and showed him a still photo from that surveillance footage, he declined to continue talking with police about the incident, Murphy wrote.
Abdi was charged with Class A robbery, a felony punishable by up to 30 years in prison.
He didn’t enter a plea in court Monday because the charge was a felony, which is likely to be brought before an Androscoggin County grand jury by the Androscoggin County District Attorney’s Office for possible indictment.
Assistant District Attorney Lisa Bogue told the judge Abdi had a criminal history dating back to 2012 that included two convictions of violation of condition of release, operating under the influence and disorderly conduct.
Defense attorney James Howaniec told Judge Field that Abdi has lived in the city since he was 13 years old and graduated from Lewiston High School. He holds a seasonal job at L.L.Bean.
His mother, two aunts and sister appeared in court Monday along with three men from the Somali community to show their support for Abdi.
When he read a story about the shooting in the local newspaper over the weekend, Howaniec said he wondered whether he might be representing in court on Monday “the person who did the shooting. I’m standing here representing the person who was shot.”
Howaniec said his client “strongly denies” the charge, noting the witness referenced in the affidavit “makes no mention of a knife.”
“What obviously elevates this matter is the fact that there is a gun involved, but not a gun owned by my client. It was owned by this individual who I’m not so sure should have been carrying a gun,” Howaniec said.
He said there were “proof problems” with the case, noting Hensler’s difficulty recounting where he was when he fired the final three shots.
Howaniec was seeking a low cash bail of $1,000 with supervised release.
He said his client is eager to talk about the incident.
“He feels strongly that he was the victim in this case. There was an allegation made that somebody made the statement, ‘Now that Mr. Trump’s been elected, that now America’s going to be great again and we’re not going to have to deal with people like Mr. Abdi,'” Howaniec said.
Bogue told the judge that the evidence collected in the case so far contradicts Abdi’s account of events.
cwilliams@sunjournal.com
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