A man was charged with murder on Friday in the hit-and-run death of a 15-year-old boy who was leaving the Somali Center of Kansas City, in what the FBI is probing as a possible hate crime, prosecutors said.
Ahmed Aden, 34, was charged with first degree murder, armed criminal action, leaving the scene of an accident and unlawful use of a weapon in the death of Abdisamad Sheikh-Hussein, prosecutors said.
Witnesses told police Aden was speeding in an SUV when it veered suddenly and struck Sheikh-Hussein as he was getting into a parked car outside the mosque on Thursday evening, Kansas City police said in a probable cause statement.
Aden fled the scene on foot, waved a machete and appeared to have a gun, but was arrested within minutes, the police said. Sheikh-Hussein, who police said was of Somali descent, died at a local hospital.
Aden first told police he had lost control of the SUV, then later said he was looking for four males who had threatened to kill him several days ago and thought the boy was one of them, the police said.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is investigating the incident as a possible hate crime, FBI spokeswoman Bridget Patton said, but she declined to elaborate. An FBI agent was at the scene Thursday night, and the FBI is working with Kansas City police, she said.
The Kansas chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) requested a federal probe of the crash, identifying the teenager as Muslim.
"We again ask local, state and national religious and political leaders to speak out against the rising level of anti-Muslim rhetoric in our society, which can and does lead to such violent incidents," CAIR-Kansas Chairman Moussa Elbayoumy said in a statement.
Somali Center officials have said that a man has threatened the local Muslim community for months, though it is not clear if Aden was that person, the council said.
