Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, September 26, 1993 TAG: 9309260045
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Before an hour had passed, Laura Nazrini had shot an apparent burglar, and he lay dying on the store's carpeted floor.
Earlier, Bobby Nazrini had been jumping through the channels trying to find something to watch on television - CNN or Saturday Night Live reruns, he said.
Laura Nazrini was washing her hair in a sink when she heard a loud banging, which she thought was the family dog or her daughter.
But her husband hollered that someone was breaking into the store.
Wrapping a towel around her wet head, Laura Nazrini rushed to join her husband at the open doorway that separates their living area from the clothing business.
And she grabbed a shotgun.
In the dim light, the couple said they saw a "very large" man in a baseball cap stripping clothing from the racks in the store.
"He was going like a mad animal in here," Laura Nazrini said.
To get inside, the man had busted open a steel door and pushed aside a video-game machine called "Scramble" that had been sitting in front of the door.
"He was coming at us," Laura Nazrini said. "The dog was barking, and my daughter was hysterical. I was shaking violently."
The man, whom the Nazrinis had never seen before, was cursing, and Bobby Nazrini said he cursed him back. The intruder said "I'm going to kill you . . ." Bobby Nazrini said.
Laura Nazrini said she didn't wait to see if the man had a gun. "It was just mass hysteria, so I shot," she said.
It was 9:50 p.m.
The whole episode had taken roughly two minutes, Bobby Nazrini said.
The man died at Roanoke Memorial Hospital. Police refused to identify him Saturday, because they hadn't notified his next of kin.
After his wife fired the shot, Bobby Nazrini took the gun and held it on the man, even though it was a single-shot weapon and now unloaded, he said.
When the man said he had been shot, the Nazrinis called 911. At the advice of the emergency dispatcher, they stayed away from the front of the store until police knocked a short time later.
Police took the Nazrinis to the police station a few blocks away to take their statements. The Nazrinis didn't get to bed until 4:30 Saturday morning.
Police have not charged Laura Nazrini in the shooting. Maj. J.L. Viar said he plans to discuss the shooting with Commonwealth's Attorney Donald Caldwell.
"She apparently is going to be somewhat justified," Viar said.
Saturday afternoon, the Nazrinis tended their store as customers filed through the racks of brightly colored "high-fashion" clothing.
A steam cleaning machine sat by the front door.
The clothing the man was carrying when he was shot was ruined, Bobby Nazrini said.
In addition to the store at Campbell and Patterson, the Nazrinis have another Hype City store on Williamson Road. They have been in Roanoke about six months, coming here from Asheville, N.C.
They have operated businesses in a number of cities, Laura Nazrini said. They have had trouble with people before, breaking glass and things like that, but no one has ever broken in and tried to kill them, her husband said.
"I'm sorry he was dead," Laura Nazrini said, "but he was somewhere he shouldn't have been."
Keywords:
FATALITY
by CNB