Palo Alto police have arrested a San Jose resident who they said repeatedly discharged a stun gun at a taxi driver after refusing to pay his cab fare early Thursday morning.
The incident took place early Thursday morning on El Camino Real, according to a police news release. The taxi driver reportedly picked up Amir Sakaev, 27, in San Jose and had driven him to Palo Alto, police said. Once they reached the Palo Alto destination on El Camino, near Military Way, Sakaev allegedly exited the cab and attempted to leave without paying the fare.
When the driver followed him and demanded payment, Sakaev allegedly pulled a stun gun out of his pocket and began firing it at the driver, police said.
Police said the stun gun that Sakaev used had an electricity arc at its tip (rather than probes, like a Taser would fire). The driver, seeing the stun gun, ran back into the taxi, locked the car and called 911, police said. While the call was being made shortly after 3 a.m., Sakaev reportedly stood at the window of the Ford Crown Victoria cab and continued to fire the stun gun, according to the police.
Police said the driver was not injured and was never touched by electricity. Sakaev, meanwhile, ultimately stopped discharging the stun gun and began to walk away southbound. Police found him several minutes after the incident was reported on the 3900 block of El Camino, the stun gun still in his possession, according to the news release.
Police said Sakaev was on active parole for criminal threats, as well as on probation for vandalism and violation of a court order. He was booked into the Santa Clara County Main Jail for armed robbery (felony), being a felon in possession of a stun gun (misdemeanor) and a probation violation (misdemeanor).
Anyone with information about the incident is asked to call the department’s 24-hour dispatch center at 650-239-2413. Anonymous tips can be emailed to paloalto@tipnow.org or sent via text message or voicemail to 650-383-8984.
Please law enforcement, please take this guy very seriously …
– Police said Sakaev was on active parole for criminal threats,
– as well as on probation for vandalism and violation of a court order.
Wow, what kind of behavior is that? Is it too far-fetched to predict
this person is going to be a big problem wherever he goes for the
rest of his life. I hope this warning behavior is taken seriously by the
whatever judge he appears before and he gets the maximum penalty
available for this kind of criminal behavior.
A quick Google shows this guy is on MySpace.Com under the name
1shot2shot https://myspace.com/1shot2shot
Maybe see this is person has any guns … and please do something
to predict and make sure we do not have another mass criminal in
the making.