Nimo Abdi, 32, was asleep with her 4-year-old son when a bullet struck her home in Riverton Park in September. Derek Davis/Staff Photographer
A Portland man has been found guilty of charges stemming from a shooting outside a public housing complex last fall that wounded one woman and sent bullets through a 4-year-old’s bedroom walls.
Jurors this week convicted Abdihamit Ali, 22, on three counts: elevated aggravated assault, reckless conduct with a dangerous weapon and criminal mischief.
A bullet hit entered a room where a mother and child were sleeping in September. The bullet hole, seen in this photo, has been filled in since the shooting. Derek Davis/Staff Photographer
He will be sentenced at a later date. Cumberland County Superior Justice MaryGay Kennedy will determine the result of a fourth charge for being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm.
After a three-day trial, Ali was found guilty of firing several rounds at Marwa Mohammad, 20, as she was walking from her car to an apartment at the Riverton Park public housing complex early on Sept. 2. Several bullets ricocheted off her car and hit a nearby apartment. One bullet pierced a boy’s bedroom while he slept inside with his mom.
“Obviously, the jury took in all the evidence, the testimony, and the physical evidence, and decided it was proven beyond a reasonable doubt,” said Deputy District Attorney Jennifer Ackerman.
But defense attorneys for Ali said Friday that they were disappointed with the verdict and felt there was still doubt about Ali’s guilt.
“Our general theory was Marwa had made a mistake in terms of who it was she had seen that night,” said Daniel Wentworth, whom the court appointed to represent Ali with attorney Zachary Fey. “She had made a couple of multiple inconsistent statements. We thought there was some question as to whether or not her identification was totally reliable.”
Ali’s attorneys said investigators failed to perform their due diligence and continue investigating the shooting after Ali’s arrest.
Nimo Abdi looks out the window of a room where she was sleeping with her 4-year-old son when a bullet tore through their home at Riverton Park, a low-income public housing complex in Portland, in September. Derek Davis/Staff Photographer
THE SHOOTING
Mohammad told police she had been in a fight with Ali at Woodford’s Club hours before the shooting.
It was roughly 3 a.m. when she arrived in Riverton and saw an unknown vehicle driving toward her at “full speed,” according to an affidavit by Portland Police Detective Matthew Rider.
When the car stopped, a large man came out firing at her and walked toward her until they were face-to-face. She recognized him from the fight at Woodford’s, according to the affidavit.
“And he now asked her ‘Do you want to die’ before shooting her in the leg and saying ‘take it (expletive),'” the affidavit states.
Both Ali and Mohammad were gone by the time police arrived at the housing complex. There, officers interviewed Nimo Abdi, who had been sleeping beside her 4-year-old son when the shooting began.
Police then learned Mohammad was at Maine Medical Center seeking treatment for her leg wound. There, she told police that she was familiar with Ali but did not know him by name. Officers showed her eight different black-and-white pictures and asked if she recognized the shooter. She pointed to a picture of Ali, according to the affidavit.
“I am 1,000% positive it was him,” she stated.
Ali’s attorneys said the lineup was poorly conducted and that the officer was already familiar with Ali, running the risk that the lineup process was suggestive. There also weren’t enough people in the lineup who were Somali, like both Mohammad and Ali, or who were his age. One person was pictured twice, the attorneys argued.
“There are more accurate ways to do photo identifications,” Wentworth said. “The portland police don’t employ what’s largely considered to be the most accurate way they can do that.”
Ackerman said it was a “perfectly acceptable photo array.” She said the fact that Mohammad knew Ali before the shooting also lent to her credibility – she could identify some of his family members by name, Ackerman said, and where he had gone to high school.
AN ALLEGED CHASE IN SACO
Ali was incarcerated at the York County Jail until November, when a judge agreed to lower his bail from $100,000 to $25,000 and he was released.
He’s accused of violating those bail conditions in January. Portland police were sent to his home on Oxford Street after getting a call from officers in Saco who said they tried to chase a white Kia Optima that failed to comply with a traffic stop around midnight. The car was registered to Ali.
Ali got home shortly after 1:30 a.m. in a 207 taxi, wrapped in a white hospital blanket.
According to court records, Ali later said he was coming from Maine Medical Center, where he had been seeking treatment for injuries he sustained when someone stole his car.
But Rider, the detective, wrote that police couldn’t find any record of a stolen vehicle and doubted that Ali had gone to the hospital for medical help because he called a cab only 12 minutes after arriving.
Wentworth and Fey said they couldn’t comment on the allegations because Ali’s charge for violating the conditions of his release is still pending. Ackerman said police were unable to execute a search warrant for Ali’s cellphone data, which would’ve revealed his location at the time of the Saco chase.
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