A security guard was acquitted of murder on Thursday, Sept. 4 for the 2023 killing of a homeless man at an apartment complex in Stanton.
An Orange County Superior Court jury deliberated for less than five hours before finding Amro Mahmoud Shahin not guilty of both second-degree murder and a lesser charge of voluntary manslaughter.
Prosecutors accused Shahin, 41, of stabbing Brandon Cook to death while Cook struggled with Shahin and another security guard — Mustafa Mohamed — at the complex on Katella Avenue just east of Knott Avenue on Jan. 7, 2023.
Shahin’s attorney, Faisal Dittu, told jurors that it was Mohamed, not Shahin, who killed Cook.
Shahin and Mohamed were both working as security guards at the Park Place Apartments. On the night of Cook’s death, Shahin was in charge of checking on fire alarms at the complex, while Mohamed was tasked with patrolling the building to make sure there were no transients and no one was breaking into residents’ cars, according to court filings.
While patrolling the parking lot, Mohamed spotted Cook on a bike, prosecutors wrote in a trial brief. Cook told Mohamed he was visiting a friend at the complex, prosecutors wrote, and Mohamed responded that it was past visitor hours and Cook needed to leave. Cook “talked back” to Mohamed and kept going, prosecutors added.
Mohamed and Shahin lost sight of Cook behind some parked cars, prosecutors wrote, but spotted him a short time later with a screwdriver in his hand appearing to be trying to open a parked vehicle.
A “verbal alteration” between Mohamed and Cook turned physical after Cook entered the lobby of the apartment complex and tried to get in an elevator, prosecutors wrote. The altercation — which prosecutors say included Cook punching Mohamed and hitting him with a chain and lock Cook had around his neck — apparently moved onto a nearby street.
Prosecutors allege that the altercation involving the three men ended with Shahin pushing Cook to the ground and then getting on top of him to hold him down. A screwdriver fell out of Cook’s pocket, prosecutors wrote, and Shahin grabbed it and stabbed Cook.
Witnesses described hearing Cook scream, “They stabbed me!” and “Momma! Help me! Help me momma!” as well as Mohamed allegedly saying, “You deserve this.” Cook was pronounced dead a short time later at a hospital.
Dittu, the defense attorney, told jurors there was no weapon, no motive, no DNA and no blood evidence tying Shahin to Cook’s killing. Mohamed — who the defense blamed for Cook’s death — fled the country after the killing. The attorney wrote in a trial brief that Mohamed told a supervisor after the killing that Cook attacked him with a chain and that “I got out my knife and stabbed him.”
Shahin embraced his attorney after the verdict, as Orange County Superior Court Judge Gary S. Paer ordered that he be released from county jail as soon as possible.
“You are extremely fortunate you had an attorney who fought tooth and nail, who uncovered every stone,” the judge told Shahin after jurors left the courtroom.
Mohamed is facing a voluntary manslaughter charge in connection with Cook’s death, court records show, and is currently listed as a fugitive.