Screwdriver attack on gas station clerk caught on tape

CCTV:March 11/09,NJ.A Slidell man is being held without bond for allegedly stabbing and beating a gas station cashier while on the run from parole authorities in New Jersey. Police caught up with Terrance N. Kennedy, 47, hours after the 10 p.m. attack on March 11 and booked him with attempted murder. Surveillance footage from a camera in the BP station at 430 Pontchartrain Drive, shows a man who is shoeless and wearing a tank-top and shorts entering and immediately grabbing the clerk behind the cash register. As the victim tries to fend him off, the suspect begins stabbing the man with a screwdriver before throwing him to the ground. Though there is no sound on the video, Slidell Police spokesman Capt. Kevin Foltz said the clerk later told police the suspect demanded money and threatened to kill him if he didn't comply. A witness walks out of a back room in the gas station, sees the fight and immediately runs out of the building. He called police as soon as he was outside, Foltz said. The suspect then turned his attention back to the clerk, who is still on the ground and kicks at him to try to keep him away. After dragging the man across the floor, the suspect starts to storm outside toward the witness. He quickly returns, however, and he and the clerk circle a bin of beer cans. The suspect still brandishes his screwdrivers and the clerk holds up a full can as if he is threatening to throw it at his assailant. The clerk backs off, at which point Kennedy tosses beer cans at him and makes toward the register while his victim flees the store. The attacker throws another can after him, shattering the glass door, before ducking under another can thrown at him and charging into the parking lot. Once out of the store, the suspect tried to stab the clerk again and then dashed into a blue Pontiac and drove off, hitting two cars on his way out of the parking lot, Foltz said. Police arrived shortly after the man left and an investigating officer noticed the cashier had a bloody hole in his shirt, Foltz said. The man lifted his shirt, revealing slashes across his stomach and minor marks where he was stabbed, said Detective Mario Arthur III, who was on the scene. Emergency crews bandaged him at the scene and he was released without being taken to the hospital, Arthur said. After taking a description of the attacker's vehicle, police realized it was the same van that had been spotted during an attempted burglary at Champagne Jewelers off of Gause Boulevard about an hour earlier, Arthur said. Witnesses said they saw a man put two large rocks in a bag and try to smash the front window of the store, he said. That attempt was thwarted when the rocks failed to break the glass. Authorities found the suspect at his home before dawn and arrested him without incident, Arthur said. Kennedy, who was living at 426 Beech St., was on the run from authorities in New Jersey, where he was on parole after serving 25 years in prison for murder, according to the New Jersey Department of Corrections. He was paroled in 2006 and disappeared in January 2008, according to the department. The details of the murder case were not available this week. Kennedy was booked into the St. Tammany Parish jail in Covington with attempted first-degree murder, attempted armed robbery, simple burglary, attempted simple burglary and being a fugitive. Because of his parole status, he is being held without bond, Foltz said. Foltz said he did not make details about the arrest public more quickly because he had not been notified of the incident until this week.

LiveLeak | March 25, 2009

Tags:. .assailant. .screwdrivers. .terrance. .fend. .cashier