His girlfriend said her ‘world had ended’.
An American student was shot and killed by a woman he had stopped to help on the side of the road.
Adam Simjee, 22, had been on a road trip with his girlfriend Mikayla Paulus when he pulled over to help Yasmine Hider, who told the couple her car had broken down.
The pair tried to repair the car on the roadside in Talladega National Forest in Alabama before realising it wouldn’t start again.
At this point, Hider pulled out a gun and ordered them into the woods. She then demanded that the couple drop their phones and give her their banking information.
Simjee then pulled out a gun that he was carrying, and exchanged fire with Hider.
He was shot in the back during the gunfight and pronounced dead at the scene. Hider was injured and taken to hospital, where she was later charged with the student’s murder.
In a tribute on social media, Paulus said her world had “ended.”
She wrote: “My reason for being, my soulmate, my life partner, the future father of my children, died in the middle of a state park in Alabama.
“No words can begin to describe the shock and pain I’m in. We had our entire lives ahead of us. Adam is the best person I’ve ever met on the face of this entire planet.
“He was the most pure soul and he made sure I knew I would be safe when I was with him. It comforts me to say he passed in one of his favourite places, the forest in the mountains.”
https://www.facebook.com/mikayla.paulus.3/posts/pfbid02uEpHEaj4LSL5rnvap6TjR5GdZVpMZQCuno2o1oqG5Djurg5VaAe7CD1RHPfAYPbgl
In a statement, Clay County Sheriff’s Office said another woman, Krystal Pinkins, had also been arrested. Along with Hider, she was charged with one count of murder, two counts of kidnapping and two counts of robbery.
Pinkins had fled the scene after the shooting but was tracked down with the help of police dogs to a large group of tents that officials described as a “base camp,” NBC reports.
A five-year-old boy was also taken into custody after he was spotted holding a shotgun. He is believed to be Pinkins’ son.
The sheriff said: “As officers were ordering the female to the ground a five-year-old child ran from the woods holding a loaded shotgun.
“Law enforcement told the child to put the shotgun down however the child continued to the female’s location before laying the gun on the ground.”
Simjee was a student at the University of Central Florida (UCF) and had been studying as a finance major. Paulus was about to embark on her first semester at UCF, studying a master’s degree in counsellor education.
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