
A Victorville shoe store owner accused of shooting and wounding a 9-year-old girl when opening fire at suspected shoplifters has agreed to returned from Nevada to face at least one charge.
Police have said that Marqel Cockrell, 20, fled from Victorville in his car just after the girl, identified by family members as Ava Chruniak, was mistakenly hit by bullets on Tuesday, April 12, as she waited to have her picture taken with an Easter bunny at the Mall of Victor Valley.
Cockrell, 20, stood in court on Thursday, April 14, and told a Las Vegas judge that he understood that California authorities had 30 days to extradite him. He was not represented by an attorney because Nevada does not provide lawyers for extradition cases.
Cockrell co-owns the shoe store Sole Addicts at the mall and was chasing two shoplifters about 6:30 p.m. Tuesday when he fired shots that “instead hit the 9-year-old female victim,” Victorville police have said in a statement.
The girl suffered three gunshot wounds, including two in an arm, said her grandmother, Moraga-Saldarelli. One bullet fractured an arm bone.
She was released from the hospital on Thursday but will require another operation to repair nerve damage, KCBS-TV reported.
“I will never forgive him. What he did to me is not OK,” the girl told the station from her bed at home. “No one should have a gun in the mall.”
Police have said that Cockrell drove away from the mall before responding officers arrived. He was arrested in Nevada’s Clark County, about a three-hour drive from Victorville.
Cockrell was being held at the Clark County Detention Center in Las Vegas. Authorities have said he faces at least one attempted murder charge.
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