Woman found slain in store

Police suspect robbery as motive

By Annie Linskey | Sun reporter

July 22, 2008

City police conduct interviews at the Family Dollar Store, where an assistant manager was found dead. (Sun photo by Amy Davis / July 21, 2008)

An assistant manager of the Family Dollar Store in the Mount Clare Junction Shopping Center in Southwest Baltimore was found slain at her workplace yesterday morning, according to city police.

Authorities did not release the victim's name yesterday, saying her relatives had not been notified.

Several store employees arrived for work about 9 a.m. yesterday and were surprised to find the door to the store locked. They waited and then called another assistant manager to let them into the building at the shopping center in the 1200 block of W. Pratt St.

They found a woman's body fully clothed and covered in blood, police said. It was not immediately clear how she had been killed, said Agent Donny Moses a police spokesman. Moses said that detectives believe the motive for the killing was robbery, but he added that it did not appear that anything had been taken.

Moses said there was no sign that anyone had forced the way into the store. "It appears that she was alone in the store," Moses said. "Her and her killer."

The store was closed yesterday morning, and a group of shoppers gathered in the parking lot. "I'm pretty upset," said Michele Wroten, who said she wanted to buy kitty litter at the store. "Everyone's been waiting for Family Dollar to open and it just didn't."

A handwritten sign on the door said: "Closed for emergency."

Family Dollar Store workers outside the store declined to comment.

Josh Braverman, a spokesman for Family Dollar Store, could not say how long the woman had worked for the store and had few details about the killing. "Our stores are sometimes robbed, but we take every precaution to keep them safe," he said.

There have been 118 homicides in the city this year, compared with 178 at this time last year, according to police statistics.

annie.linskey@baltsun.com

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Woman found slain in store

Police suspect robbery as motive

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