Suspected hit-and-run driver related to Seward Market robber
The man charged earlier this week in the hit-and-run death of Jessica Hanson is related to one of the men involved in a triple murder committed a few years ago. Abdirahman Abdi Ali, 25, is the older brother of Ahmed Shire Ali. On the night of Jan. 6, 2010, Ahmed Shire Ali and Mahdi Hassan Ali - no relation - walked into the Seward Market to commit a robbery. Mahdi Ali killed three men in the store that night and is serving a life sentence in prison. Ahmed Shire Ali pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and is also serving prison time.
The gun used in that triple murder, a Springfield Armory XD-40 40 caliber pistol, was never found. But authorities know it was stolen, along with several other guns, from the Frontiersman gun shop in St. Louis Park a few weeks before the murders. In September of 2010, one of the other guns stolen from that gun store (another Springfield Armory XD40) was found in a car along with several men. One of those men was Abdirahman Abdi Ali. He was arrested for being in possession of the stolen gun, but was not charged.
According to court documents from the Seward Market murder trial, Abdirahman Abdi Ali helped his younger brother, Ahmed Shire Ali, throw out some of the clothes he wore during the robbery attempt. However, Ahmed Shire Ali didn't say his older brother gave him the gun Mahdi Ali used to kill the men at the Market that night.
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