In the final hours of 2015, the family of a D.C. store clerk shot to death in 2011 got a phone call they had been waiting to receive for years.
D.C. police have charged an 18-year-old in the murder of Mohammed Muktar Abdulselam, 37, Police Chief Cathy Lanier told News4. The suspect was just 14 years old at the time of the crime.
"The armed robbery suspect in this case shot and killed him simply because he was an employee of the store," Lanier said.
Abdulselam, of Northeast, D.C., was shot about 8:30 p.m. Oct. 17, 2011 during an armed robbery of King Gas Station on the 2900 block of Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue SE, in Congress Heights.
The case remained unsolved until the final day of 2015.
Abdulselam was one of five people murdered during a 48-hour spasm of violence in the District. Lanier said the arrest of his accused killer was the work of investigators who never gave up and citizens who refused to look the other way.
"We had information from this community that helped us get where we are today, and we had forensic evidence," she said. "Those two things together allowed us to finally bring closure to this family."
Local
Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia local news, events and information
Abdulselam was an Ethiopian immigrant who moved to the U.S. in 2007, his family told The Washington Post after his death. The night he was killed, his shift ended at 8 p.m.; he stayed later to help the night cashier, the paper reported.
The homicide suspect, who was not named, will be charged as a juvenile.
Lanier said the arrest of a suspect in the worker's death sends criminals and would-be criminals a message: "If you're willing to commit a crime here, we might not get you today, but we're not going to stop until we get you," she said.
