MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – A 26-year-old Minneapolis man is accused of fleeing police in a motor vehicle and eventually telling them he was “Osama Bin Laden Jr.,” according to charges filed Friday in Hennepin County Court.
Abdi Hussein Sheikh was charged with one felony count of fleeing police in a motor vehicle in connection with the Feb. 6 incident.
According to a criminal complaint, Minneapolis Police officers were involved with a traffic stop when a car driven by a Somali man, later identified as Sheikh, stopped across the street from the officers at the intersection of Washington Avenue North and 2nd Avenue North.
Sheikh was yelling loud at the officers and blasting his car audio before police told him to move along.
After a short time passed, he returned to the scene, yelled loudly again at officers and appeared to be holding something in his hand. The complaint states that’s when police pointed a gun at him and ordered him to stop. Sheikh refused, and a chase ensued. Officers learned that his car had been reported stolen the day before.
Shiekh led police through Minneapolis, even stopping his car at the light rail platform on 3rd Avenue South and 5th Street. Officers tried to get him out of his locked car and even smashed out his window, but Sheikh knocked a gun out of an officer’s hand and his flee continued, according to the complaint.
Sheikh went through the streets of downtown Minneapolis at 80 to 90 miles per hour before police executed a pit maneuver, causing him to crash near 46th and Lake Street. He was placed under arrest, was hostile with police and then claimed to authorities that he was “Osama Bin Laden Jr.”
An investigation revealed the car he was driving was reported stolen on Feb. 4. Sheikh was arrested and is currently in the Hennepin County Jail.
If convicted, he faces up to three years in jail and a $5,000 fine.
