Cell Phone Transaction Ambush
Salt Lake City, Utah – One man is in jail after robbing a father and his daughter during a cell phone purchase ambush.
According to Unified Police Sergeant Melody Gray, the daughter had found a posting online offering to sell an iPhone. After messaging the seller who identified himself as “Lil,” she arranged to meet him to pay $290 for the phone.
After agreeing to meet “Lil” in Salt Lake City later that day, the girl went with her father to the address. After pulling out the cash for the transaction, the father and his daughter approached the home at the address and knocked on the door. After a time with no answer, the pair returned to their vehicle when they were approached by two men who threatened them with a knife and gun.
The suspects demanded they turn over the money and relived them of a phone that was in the center console of the father’s car. With their stolen goods in hand, the pair of suspects fled the scene.
The father then pulled his gun and fired three shots at the men as they ran away, telling officers he did so because he, “was in fear for others’ lives, knowing they had a gun.”
No one was injured by the gunfire, but officers were able to find 20-year-old Buk Mawut Buk and his juvenile cousin who had helped him commit the crime because both matched the descriptions given to police by the victims.
On first contact with officers, Buk allegedly gave the officers the name of another cousin. When detectives contacted the mother of the juvenile suspect, she told them Buk had given them the name of one of her other sons who had been with her at the time of the crime.
Buk, who his aunt said she has raised like a son in her home, has a lengthy criminal record which includes, shoplifting, failure to appear in court, theft, interference with an officer and obstruction of justice and had several outstanding warrants for his arrest.
After questioning Buk, detectives learned the two suspects were cousins and it was Buk who’d made the post to lure the victims to the scene of the crime. Buk admitted to having the knife and a realistic BB gun on him when he ran from officers but threw them away.
Buk has been charged with two counts of aggravated robbery and intentionally giving a false name to police.
No charges have been filed against the father for shooting at the suspects as they fled the scene.
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