Video shows Falls shop owner's final moments
Jul. 24—The store security camera video could not have been clearer.
In a series of video clips, taken by cameras located both inside and outside of the Bridgeway Market in the Falls, prosecutors showed a Niagara County Court jury the robbery and murder of Ahmad "Poppy" Alsaid.
Some members of the six man, six woman jury craned their necks in the makeshift, socially distanced jury box of State Supreme Court Justice Richard C. Kloch Sr.'s Lockport courtroom as they watched on Friday afternoon. They stared intently at the images on the big screen TVs as two suspects, wearing masks and with hoodies up over their heads, walked hurriedly down Memorial Parkway, on the market's south side, at 7:24 p.m. on Nov. 21, 2018.
A second video clip showed the suspects coming around the corner, from Memorial Parkway on to Niagara Street and running into the market through its front entrance door. One of the suspects in the video is moving so quickly, he slips and almost falls in the doorway.
In a third video, the suspects can be seen running toward the front counter of the market, where Alsaid can also be seen, sitting behind a protective shield and right next to a cash register. Both suspects are wildly waving black handguns, first in the air and then at the startled shopkeeper.
As one suspect points his weapon between an opening in the shield, the second darts behind the counter and confronts Alsaid. In the video Alsaid can be seen standing up and reaching toward the register.
Then the suspect in front of the counter bolts back toward the front door of the market, while the suspect behind the counter appears to engage in an escalating confrontation with Alsaid.
Prosecutors say they believe that when the robbery erupted, Alsaid grabbed a BB gun that family members said he kept under the cash register, pointing it at the suspect behind the counter. Though there was no sound recorded on the security camera video, the suspect is seen stepping back from Alsaid, leveling his handgun and then, the popular store owner falls to the floor.
The suspect behind the counter is then seen rifling through the cash register drawer before he races back toward the front of the store, where the other suspect is standing as a look-out. The last video clip shows the two suspects running back around the corner and north on Memorial Parkway.
The time stamps on the video show the robbery started at 7:24 p.m. and ends seconds before 7:26 p.m.
At 7:26 p.m., Falls Police 911 dispatcher Bettina Graves answered an incoming call. Once again, as prosecutors played a recording of the call, the jurors appeared to listen closely as Graves spoke with the caller.
While the caller's voice is muffled, Graves can clearly be heard on the recording, calling out information.
"They shot Poppy," Graves said, her voice rising excitedly.
The caller tells her that the Bridgeway market has been robbed, that there were two bandits and that Poppy has been shot and is "on the ground."
"Is he bleeding badly?" Graves asks.
"Yes...yes...yes," the caller replies.
Graves then begins to instruct the caller on how to tend to the seriously wounded shopkeeper. She advises him to apply pressure to a gunshot wound to Alsaid's abdomen and reassured him that police were on the way.
Alsaid was rushed to the Erie County Medical Center in Buffalo, where he died from his wounds.
Falls police and prosecutors say the robbers were Jonathan McEnnis and William Coleman. The jurors who listened to opening statements Friday morning and then watched the video clips and heard the 911 call in the afternoon will ultimately decide if the pair are guilty of murder, robbery and weapons possession charges.
McEnnis, 36, of Keystone Avenue in Buffalo, and Coleman, 31, of Niagara Falls, are are each charged with two counts of second-degree murder, three counts of first-degree robbery and two counts of second-degree criminal possession of a weapon in the slaying of Alsaid.
Testimony in the trial will resume on Monday.
