34-year-old Black Man with a Checkered Past, Ahmed Hersi Abdi charged with raping 10-year-old in Somalian Dominated Section 8 Cedar Riverside Housing Complex

MINNEAPOLIS - A Minneapolis man is charged with raping a 10-year-old girl in her apartment building in the Cedar Riverside neighborhood.

A criminal complaint filed in Hennepin County charges 34-year-old Ahmed Hersi Abdi with two counts of first degree criminal sexual conduct. If convicted, Abdi faces the prospect of spending more than 30-years of his life in jail.

"People are sad, they’re shocked, and they're concerned for the welfare of the young girl, and they’re looking saying, what happened? What could have been done differently?" Mohamud Noor, a Somali community leader and a former Minneapolis school board member, told KARE.

Minneapolis Police squads were called to the Riverside Plaza Apartments at on Sunday October 4 by an off-duty officer after witnesses told them a child had been sexually assaulted. They told police they heard screaming from a third floor hallway and saw a young girl crying. The witnesses said a man had pulled her pants down and done something to her.

The witnesses quickly found two off-duty Minneapolis officers were working security in a nearby building.

"The Somalian community who came across this girl in crisis stepped up and helped her," Minneapolis Police Dept. spokesperson John Elder told KARE.

"They trusted the officers enough to get them, to bring them into this situation to provide aid."

The little girl told officers that a man had followed her onto the elevator, and then into the third floor hallway. He asked her name, extended his hand to her and asked her to shake hands. The girl told police that the man then refused to let go, ordered her to turn around, pull down her tights and at that point sexually assaulted her.

She described her attacker as a dark skinned male with gray hair, a light mustache and a red and white striped shirt.

Police viewed videotape of the attacker and the girl entering the elevator together and identified their suspect as Abdi, he was located and arrested in St. Paul wearing the same clothing.

Elder said that the quick arrest of Abdi illustrates the value of community policing, the concept of officers getting out of patrol cars and having positive contacts with people in their patrol routes. That includes going to meetings and events, talking to people on foot patrols and spontaneous interactions such as joining a pickup basketball game in a park.

"If people trust their police department they’re willing to call them, and so far this year our officers have logged more than 70,000 positive contacts."

Attacks involving strangers and children are relatively rare, and some in the Riverside Plaza area see it as an isolated case. But, just the same, the news of the rape sent a chill through the area.

"I’m a mom, and I have girls, and I do understand her pain," Fadumo Yusuf, who runs the East African Services non-profit, told KARE.

She said her daughter is the same age as the victim and goes to the same school.

"I couldn’t believe it, and my daughter was so scared. She was saying, 'I cannot go anymore outside by myself'."

Yusuf said she expects the girl to receive counseling to get beyond the emotional scars left by the attack.

Noor said that the suspect, Ahmed Abdi, is a familiar face in the neighborhood and has complained of needing help for an untreated mental illness.

"You know it’s somebody who is mentally ill, and he has been seeking help and services and we feel that there’s a huge gap in mental health services, a huge unmet need."

By the same token, he said the community will embrace the victim and makes sure nobody treats her differently.