Louisiana State Police announced Monday that they have opened an investigation into the fatal shooting of a 25-year-old Yemeni-American man by an Ascension County Sheriff’s Officer and a deputy.
The victim, who was killed outside a gas station, has been identified as Abdulrahman Aljabal, a Gonzales resident.
According to police, Aljabal “exited his vehicle with a gun and, despite receiving repeated orders from officers to drop the weapon, fired into the air before pointing the weapon at officers, prompting an Ascension County Sheriff’s Deputy and a Gonzales Sheriff’s Officer to shoot him.”
He was taken to the hospital, where he later died from his injuries.
However, Yemeni-American activists have released a video showing the moment of the shooting, and they claim that the victim was not armed at the time of the incident, which contradicts the police account.
Media sources reported that Aljabal was a former employee of the gas station outside which he was killed, and had returned there around midnight on February 10 to collect his final paycheck.
Sources indicate that, at some point, he threatened the cashier and stole money from the safe, before going out to the parking lot and firing several shots into the air, some of which hit the station building.
Police arrived at the scene after receiving a report from a station employee, while details about the identity of its owner have not yet been revealed.
