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WARREN -- Two felony charges and two misdemeanor charges filed against Hakim J. Caldwell, 58, of Central Parkway Avenue SE, for an incident at a Warren dollar store last week were bound over Monday to a Trumbull County grand jury.
Felony charges of menacing and receiving stolen property and misdemeanor charges of menacing and public indecency were bound over. One misdemeanor count of reckless operation was dismissed.
Warren Municipal Court Judge Patricia Knepp presided over Monday's hearing, but Judge Natasha Natale presided over Caldwell's arraignment hearings last week. Caldwell could get a couple of years in prison if convicted of the felonies.
The charges were filed after an Oct. 16 incident at a Youngstown Road dollar store in which Caldwell is alleged to have entered the store with a scared woman, made threatening remarks to a store employee, exposed his buttocks to the employee, insinuated that he had stolen a car and refused to leave.
Two customers took matters into their own hands and “escorted” the man outside, according to a Warren police report.
Warren police were notified at 2:18 p.m. Oct. 16 that the man had left in a red four-door vehicle. Warren officers found a vehicle of that type at Youngstown and Ridge Roads and caught up to it close to North Road. The car had been reported stolen, and Caldwell was arrested. The stolen vehicle was returned to its owner.
When officers spoke with the store manager, they learned that an employee saw Caldwell enter the store following a pregnant woman. The employee tried to quietly follow Caldwell, but Caldwell turned and made a threatening remark while telling the employee not to follow him, saying he was a “Navy Seal” and saying something similar to he “wrecked this car I took," according to a police report.
Caldwell yelled at the pregnant woman, and the pregnant woman asked the employee for a place to hide. When the employee was at the cash register, Caldwell went behind the register, which he was told he was not allowed to do, the report states. Caldwell responded by telling the employee not to talk to him like that and said he would “blow up the Trumbull Homes,” an apartment complex in the area, the report states.
The employee said Caldwell exposed his buttocks to her while he was behind the register after she told him to leave the store, the report states. “Caldwell was escorted out of the store by two customers,” the report adds.
As he was being removed, he “made a threat to blow up the store,” the report states. The customers took items out of Caldwell’s pockets “that he took,” the report states.