Daytona Beach, FL – The owner of a Daytona Beach convenience store is arrested for pushing a disabled man out of his store and then out of his wheelchair.
56-year-old Saoud Dahoune – a Daytona Beach resident – was taken into custody around 3:45pm Tuesday at the J Foods on 600 North Ridgewood Avenue and charged with abuse of a handicapped person. He’s since left Volusia County Jail.
The Daytona Beach Police Department says an officer happened to be parked across from the J Foods parking lot when the call for help came in around 2:15pm.
According to the arrest report, the officer spotted the victim – a 55-year-old man – lying in the parking lot just outside of the store and 2 witnesses told the officer that they saw the entire incident.
Per the report, one of the witnesses – a 41-year-old homeless man – claimed he pushed the victim into the store on his wheelchair so he could buy a lighter and that’s when Dahoune ordered the man in the wheelchair to leave.
The witness claims Dahoune came out from behind the counter, got behind the wheelchair and backed it up right out of the store and against a curb, at which point he spun the wheelchair around and lifted the back up, causing the victim to fall out and hit the ground.
Both witnesses – the other being a 59-year-old homeless man – told police Dahoune appeared “very angry” and that he went back inside, leaving the homeless men to help the victim back into the wheelchair.
The victim wasn’t seriously hurt, per the report.
When questioned, Dahoune denied throwing the man out of the wheelchair but did ask the officer to arrest the victim for violating a trespass order.
The officer noted in her report that Dahoune claims that none of the security cameras that would’ve recorded the incident were working and that he tried to get that same officer to remove the victim earlier in the day.
The officer stated that Dahoune has never complained to her about the victim but did complain about another person earlier in the day.
VCJ records show Dahoune was previously booked in January 2004 and April 2009. His charges in those cases weren’t made available.
Saoud Dahoune (mugshot courtesy VCJ)
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