A white male in Arizona has been arrested and charged with premeditated murder after he brutally murdered a black teen over claims his rap music made the suspect feel unsafe.
27-year-old Michael Paul Adams was arrested on Thursday morning and charged with the first-degree, premeditated murder of 17-year-old Elijah Al-Amin. Arizona law enforcement officials say Adams allegedly slit the boy’s throat and stabbed him with a pocketknife at a Peoria Circle K gas station.
The teen didn’t know the suspect authorities say. But according to the Arizona Republic, the man claims he committed the murder because he felt threatened by the music the teen was playing. Superior court records say Adams told investigators that he felt threatened by the rap music because he considers it a threat to him and his community.
Adams allegedly later admitted to detectives that he heard Alamin listening to “rap music in the parking lot” through the victim’s window.
“Rap music makes him [Adams] feel unsafe, because in the past he has been attacked… by people who listen to rap music,” Adams continued to tell detectives.
Adams allegedly told detectives the “rap music,” not the victim, made him feel “threatened,” and Adams needed to be “proactive rather than reactive… [and to] protect himself and the community from the victim.”
The teen reportedly had just finished working his shift at Subway at 11:30 p.m and was on his way to visit his girlfriend when he stopped by the Circle K gas station around 1:42 a.m. Surveillance footage from the convenience store shows Al-Amin walk into the store with Adams entering a few seconds later, the Arizona Republic reports. It was inside the store where Adams allegedly stabbed the teenager and Al-Amin can be seen running out of the store before he collapsed near the gas tanks.
Al-Amin was transported to a nearby hospital and pronounced dead around 2:05 a.m. on Thursday, authorities say. Police say they later found Adams covered in blood and he reportedly admitted that he was “involved” in the heartless murder. Adams had just been released from prison on Tuesday. He is currently being held on a $1 million bond.
“He was a good kid,” El Amin’s father told KVOA in a tearful interview. “He wanted to be hotel management, he wanted to move to Seattle, he wanted to move different places.”
Elijah Al-Amin was about to celebrate his 18th birthday in two weeks.
