'Bat'man and Getaway Driver Attempt to Run Over Store Manager

Two men entered a store, stole aluminum baseball bats and then almost ran over the manager on Tuesday, the reported.

The San Jose Police Department, in a show of mutual aid, detained the suspects—Fremont resident Edward O, 23, and San Jose resident Michael Najjar, 26—until the MVPD arrived and made the arrests.

According to Liz Wylie, police spokeswoman, the suspects walked into the  store at 133 E. El Camino Real around 12: 52 p.m. The store manager saw the two enter the store and overheard one tell the other that they needed some baseball bats. They disappeared into the baseball bat section of the store, Wylie shared.

A few moments later, the manager saw the suspects leave the store. She noticed that one of the suspects—O—walked with one leg very stiff and straight. His leg did not bend. The manager then heard a metal-on-metal sound as he walked.

"She believed they had stolen baseball bats and confronted them in the parking lot," said Wylie. "She asked them if they had concealed bats in their pants, and they said, 'yes.'"

The manager told them she called the police, and according to Wylie, they both ran through the parking lot to their parked car. The manager ran inside the store to get paper and a pen to take down their license plate number.  

When she returned to get the plate number, the driver—Najjar—pulled out of the parking spot "very quickly," said Wylie, "straight toward the manager."

"She had to jump out of the way to avoid being hit by their car," Wylie said. The suspects drove eastbound out of the lot on El Camino Real, but the manager got the license plate number.

When MVPD ran the plates and learned that the registered owner lived in San Jose, they asked the SJPD for mutual aid, "since they are so much closer, and time is of the essence," Wylie explained.

San Jose police officers went to the address on the 400 block of Willard Avenue and detained both suspects at the house. The MVPD drove the store manager/victim, and she positively identified both suspects. They also recovered four aluminum bats from inside the residence, which still had Play it Again Sports price tags on them.

The MVPD made the arrested and transported to the suspects to police headquarters for interviews. Najjar, charged with a felony for assault with a deadly weapon and petty theft, was booked into main jail.

Wylie added that an "attempt" to inflict bodily harm is an element of the crime of assault, so that in this case, the attempt to strike the store manager with the car—a deadly weapon—would constitute assault with a deadly weapon, even though there was no contact.

Charged with petty theft, O was issued a citation and released from the station.