A New Jersey cab driver helped stop a high school shooting Thursday when he told the armed, angry teenager that he had 'voodoo' powers that would make the boy vanish.
This stalled the teen just long enough for the cabbie to call the cops to trigger a lockdown on the boy's target, Trenton High Central High School.
Police arrested the teen at 3:30 p.m. near the school. He was unarmed at the time.Because the boy is a minor his identity is being withheld. He faces juvenile charges of unlawful possession of a shotgun and drug offenses.
The cabbie picked the teenager up outside the school around 11 a.m Thursday.
'He asked me to take him to Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in Trenton (the student's home) and that this would be a round-trip back to the school,' said the cab driver, who asked reporters not to reveal his identity out of fear for his safety.
After they reached the boy's home he went in briefly, then returned to the cab and slid into the front seat next to the driver and put a silver pistol against his stomach.
The boy was shaking and his eyes were bloodshot.
'He told me his classmates 'almost just killed me in the cafeteria, so I'm going to kill them,' the cabbie said
'I told him that I knew how he felt, that I was once in his place, a former rebel in my West African country," the cabbie said.
The cab driver immigrated to the U.S. from Liberia. His country spent 14 years in a civil war, but he said he never acted as a rebel.
'I convinced him that he should wait until 3 p.m. to go to the school because I could get some medicine for him to make him disappear,' he said.
He thinks the boy may have believed he had 'voodoo powers' because of his strong accent and West African roots.
'I dropped him off at an address on Adeline Street and gave him a wrong number to call when he was ready,' the cabbie said. 'Then I called my cab company and they called the police.
Until the suspect was apprehended teachers were instructed to turn off the classroom lights and close the doors. Police patrolled the hallways.
Trenton police confirmed both the driver's identity and his story.
The suspect is being at Middlesex County Youth Detention Center.
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TXT 24
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