EVERETT, Wash. — Snohomish County deputies are searching for a masked gunman who fired a shot a clerk at a convenience store before being grabbed and confronted by one of the store's customers.
The clerk was not hit, but a shot shattered a beverage cooler and destroyed a case of orange juice in the next room.
Ahmed Alwadi was purchasing gas for his work van when the masked man walked into the Valero store at Highway 99 and Center Road near Paine Field, just before 9 p.m.
"The clerk asked him to leave, or to take his mask off and he said, 'I'm not taking it off.' I said, 'Man, is there any reason for that?' He said, 'No, I don't want to take it off.' So the clerk told him, 'If you don't take it off, you have to leave or I'm going to call 911.'"
Alwadi said the masked man flew into a rage when the clerk called 911.
"He said, 'Are you calling me black? Do you think I'm Muslim?' He got a gun and pointed it close to my face," Alwadi said.
The masked man fired the gun at the clerk and missed. Alwadi said he attacked the gunman, pushed him away and confronted him.
"I said, 'OK man, everyone is safe, just leave, you don't want to make it really tough, just leave.' He said, 'If you move, I'm going to kill you.' I said, 'I'm not moving.' He left," Alwadi said.
Alwad said the gunman fired five more shots while getting away.
After potentially saving lives with his actions, Alwadi asked KIRO 7 if he could make a statement.
"I'm from Iraq, Baghdad, and I live here in the United States for four years," he said. "What I want to say is as Muslims or Christians or any kind of religion, we live in this country, we want to keep it safe. I served in the US Army for nine years, and I'm glad to be doing the job over there, and I want to save every person here, too, if I had a chance. We are good people," Alwadi said.
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