Woman charged with murder in shooting death of college student in Alabama forest
A woman who police say killed a 22-year-old man after allegedly pretending to be a stranded motorist in an Alabama forest has been charged with murder, robbery and kidnapping, according to online police records posted Thursday.
Yasmine Hider, 20, was allegedly posing as a stranded motorist in the Talladega National Forest in eastern Alabama on Aug. 14 when Adam Simjee, 22, and his girlfriend, Mikayla Paulus, 20, decided to pull over to assist, police said in a statement on Aug. 15, according to The Associated Press. The statement from the sheriff’s office has since been taken down.
Hider pulled out a gun and forced the pair into the woods and attempted to rob them, according to the AP. A shootout between Simjee, who police say also had a gun, and Hider ensued, which left Simjee dead and Hider injured, the AP reported.
Hider was airlifted to a hospital in Birmingham, Alabama, and underwent multiple surgeries, the AP reported. Hider was booked on Wednesday at the Clay County Jail and charged with murder, robbery and kidnapping, according to online records from the Clay County Sheriff's Office.
Simjee and Paulus were to begin studying together at the University of Central Florida in just a few weeks, Paulus told ABC affiliate WBMA in Birmingham.
Paulus told the station the pair decided to pull over to help Hider and spent an hour trying to get her car started. After the vehicle failed to start, despite multiple attempts to try and fix it, Paulus told WBMA Hider pulled out a gun and walked the couple into the woods.
Paulus said Hider demanded the two drop their cell phones and tell her their banking passwords. However, Simjee also had a gun on him, she said.
"Adam pulled out his gun and told her to get on the ground and that's when she started messing around with her gun. It jammed once but they both shot at each other and she was shot a few times and he was shot only once," Paulus told WBMA.
Paulus was able to find her phone and call 911 despite the poor cell service in the area, she told WBMA. She then began performing CPR on Simjee, until authorities arrived on site, she said.
She said Simjee never regained consciousness and died at the scene.
Paulus had told police that she saw a second woman in the woods during the incident, the AP reported.
About a half a mile away from where the shootout happened, authorities found a camp where they believe Hider and a second woman, Krystal Diane Pinkins, had been living with Pinkins' young son, according to the AP.
"As officers were ordering the female to the ground, a 5-year-old child ran from the woods holding a loaded shotgun," police said, according to the AP. The child eventually put down the gun, the AP said.
Pinkins was booked at the Clay County Jail on Aug. 15 and charged with endangering the welfare of a child alongside charges of murder, kidnapping and robbery, online police records show.
Attorney information for Pinkins and Hider was not immediately available.
Clay County District Court Judge David Law issued a gag order on Aug. 17 to prevent both law enforcement and defense lawyers from commenting on the case.
His order also directed Clay County Sheriff Jim Studdard to remove any statements his office had previously made about the case on social media.
