Two men are charged with crimes following a theft at Home Depot, 13100 Valley View Road, on June 24 that resulted in foot chases.
Abdisalan Osman Sheikh, 22, of Minneapolis, has been charged with fleeing police, a felony.
Mustafa Jama Farah, 31, of West St. Paul, has been charged with gross misdemeanor theft and misdemeanor fleeing police.
According to charging documents filed in Hennepin District Court:
Just after 4 p.m. June 24, an Eden Prairie police officer responded to a report of a theft in progress at Home Depot. One man had fled on foot, and another was leaving in a car. An officer driving east on Valley View Road at Prairie Center Drive saw the vehicle leaving Home Depot and going west on Valley View Road.
The officer turned on his lights and siren and caught up to the vehicle, which slowed and pulled near the curb before speeding away. The officer hit the vehicle with his squad car and spun it 180 degrees. The driver, later identified as Sheikh, fled on foot.
The officer drove north on Zenith Lane and attempted to cut off Sheikh’s path of escape. Sheikh ran behind the squad car but eventually stopped, sat down on the grass and was arrested.
Sheikh was being held in lieu of $20,000 bail.
Meanwhile, another officer responding to the theft learned from a store loss-prevention employee that a man, later identified as Farah, wearing a gray and white hat, camo pants, and a hoodie, selected Milwaukee products near the back of the store and placed them into a shopping cart. He then pushed the shopping cart to the garden center and left through there.
The officer saw the man running south through the parking lot, jump off a retaining wall on the southwest side of Home Depot and onto a path that goes north and south. The officer drove his squad car on the path and saw Farah run off the path and into the woods and marsh area west of the store.
Another officer arrived, and both told Farah to stop and that he was under arrest. Farah ran further into the marsh. The officers eventually caught him in the marsh.
Home Depot told authorities the value of the merchandise Farah is accused of stealing was $786.
Farah was held in lieu of $12,000 bail. He was released from custody on June 28.
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