ROGERS : Teen disputes officer’s report about shooting
Posted on Wednesday, February 27, 2008
A Rogers High School student accused of attempted kidnapping and trying to rob his employer recently had started therapy for personal problems, an advocate for the boy’s family said Tuesday.
Jim Miranda, a lawyer and Hispanic rights advocate in Bella Vista, said Eduardo “Eddie” Hernandez, 17, suffers lingering effects because he stayed behind in Mexico as a boy while his mother came to the United States to work.
“There is a certain amount of resentment that comes with being left behind in Mexico,” Miranda said. “The boy has some issues to work out, and his mother had recognized this and had just started him in therapy.” Miranda said he’s acting as an adviser to Hernandez’ mother, Gloria Hernandez.
Benton County prosecutors said they’ll charge Hernandez and five other teens as adults in the botched armed robbery early Saturday of the Wendy’s restaurant at 2200 W. Walnut St. in Rogers.
Hernandez was shot in the arm by Rogers police officer Jason Becker, who said Hernandez pointed a sawed-off shotgun at him as the officer chased the teens from the restaurant.
In the arrest affidavit, Hernandez denied he raised the weapon. He said he was shot as he and some of the others ran from the Wendy’s and that police fired shots behind them. Hernandez said he was shot as he stopped and turned to see what was happening.
Becker — who was alone during the chase — said that as Hernandez crested the berm of a drainage ditch, the youth swung around and pointed the sawedoff shotgun at him, prompting Becker to fire once.
Hernandez fell, then got back up and ran, Becker said. He said he chased Hernandez to a waiting Jeep Cherokee, and Hernandez jumped into the back passenger seat.
Becker thought he heard the action of the shotgun being racked, felt “exposed” and worried that Hernandez would shoot him. He fired at Hernandez again.
Police found four 9 mm shell casings, the affidavit states.
Rogers police spokesman Lt. Mike Johnson said Tuesday that Becker is on administrative leave while the Benton County sheriff’s office investigates if the shooting was justified.
Becker, 27, has been with the Police Department since March.
Hernandez had surgery on his right arm at St. Mary’s Hospital in Rogers and will be arrested when he’s released, Johnson said.
Some students at the high school said Tuesday they were surprised that Hernandez is accused of trying to rob the Wendy’s where he worked and where his brother Jorge and his mother also had worked.
Student Eric Marquez said the robbery was uncharacteristic of Hernandez, whom he described as a “good guy.” “I never thought he’d do stuff like that,” Marquez said.
Hernandez and the others face felony charges of aggravated robbery, criminal use of a prohibited weapon, fleeing and kidnapping, prosecutors said. Arraignment is March 31 in circuit court.
Aaron Michael Isbell, 17, Jorge Gabriel Hernandez, 15, Evan Reilly Garvey, 17, and John Michael Schneider, 16, were in the Benton County jail on $ 150, 000 bond each Tuesday.
Ricardo Salcido, 17, has been released.
Miranda said Gloria Hernandez is an illegal immigrant, and U. S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested her on a pending deportation charge during the investigation of her sons. Officials weren’t sure when the youths joined their mother in the United States.
“I have a problem when police sic immigration officers on a mother in this poor situation,” Miranda said.
Eddie Hernandez, Schneider and Isbell are students at Rogers High, while Jorge Hernandez was expelled from Crossroads, the district’s alternative school, earlier this month, school district spokesman Ashley Kelley said.
Garvey graduated from Rogers in December, while Salcido withdrew last month to pursue a General Equivalency Development diploma, she said.
Rogers police got a 911 call from Wendy’s at 1: 37 a.m. Saturday. Becker arrived a minute later and chased two or three suspects to the Jeep, which fled with the injured Hernandez inside, the affidavit states.
Becker returned to Wendy’s, where he found Schneider, wearing a face mask, trying to run from the scene, the affidavit states.
Schneider told police he had a party at his house while his parents were in Conway and that he gave Eddie Hernandez his father’s shotgun to take to the robbery.
Schneider said they took turns cutting the barrel and stock off the shotgun with a hand saw, and they took a blue tent bag with them in order to carry any money they stole.
Rubonia McKibben told police she was sitting in the Wendy’s parking lot waiting for her son to get off work when Eddie Hernandez yanked open her door and put the shotgun to her head.
“I wasn’t scared until afterward. I was more p *****,” Mc-Kibben said Tuesday.
When the suspects demanded her money, McKibben told them she had none. Eddie Hernandez pulled her out of the car, and he and the others walked her up to the drive-through window, she said.
Manager Bryan Sutton later told police he heard a tap on the drive-through window and saw McKibben outside with a man holding a gun to her head, the affidavit states. Employees then called police.
When Becker arrived, three of the suspects ran, McKibben said.
The remaining teen slapped her on the right side of her head, hard enough to damage her glasses.
“Every time I go to sleep I can see the gun,” she said.
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