Shots, arrest in mask dispute
Suspect, officer wounded day after gunshots in parking lot
Officers were on their way to serve a warrant Saturday morning to Adam Zaborowski, charged with attempted homicide over a mask dispute at a Bethlehem Township business the day before, but police say he led them in a chase and shootout that ended with Zaborowski and a Slatington police officer wounded.
Lehigh County District Attorney Jim Martin said Zaborowski, 35, jumped in a blue pickup truck before police could serve him the warrant at his residence in Slatington. When police attempted to pull Zaborowski over, he left the truck and opened fire on officers, Martin said, adding that Zaborowski was armed with an AK-47 and a semi-automatic pistol.
“The officers returned fire,” Martin said. “Mr. Zaborowski was hit.”
Martin said he expected Zaborowski to survive. He did not say how many times Zaborowski was shot.
He said a Slatington officer was shot in the arm but that the wound was relatively minor.
Zaborowski will face additional charges of attempted criminal homicide and aggravated assault for Saturday’s incident, Martin said.
Zaborowski’s attorney, John Waldron, said Zaborowski is expected to be in the hospital for roughly two days and then will be headed to Lehigh County Jail. Waldron hadn’t yet talked to Zaborowski as of 7 p.m. Saturday but has talked to his parents, trying to gain insight in what occurred Friday and Saturday.
“I know there’s been some stressors in his life — I don’t mean that as an excuse — but I’m still learning more about what may have happened and trying to put some things together,” Waldron said.
Police had been searching for Zaborowski since around noon Friday when a spat about a mask prompted what a store clerk described as an extreme reaction from Zaborowski, who allegedly fired three shots in the store’s parking lot.
Police say Zaborowski entered the Cigars International store on Nazareth Pike at 11:23 a.m. Friday and was asked to leave because he wasn’t wearing a mask. He was offered the chance to choose what he wanted to buy and then wait for it outside, where a clerk would deliver it, witnesses said. Mat Cook, the director of retail operations for Cigars International, said Zaborowski ignored the offer, walked around the store, took two cigars and left.
A clerk followed Zaborowski outside and asked him to pay for the cigars, Cook said. That’s when Zaborowski reached into his pickup and pulled out a handgun, police said. He then fired three shots — two at the clerk and one in the air, police said.
No one was hit by the bullets, police said, but there were several patrons outside the store smoking at the time of the shooting.
An arrest warrant was issued for Zaborowski, of the 800 block of Main Street in Slatington.
Early Saturday, the sound of gunfire interrupted the tranquil summer morning, awakening some and startling others as they ate breakfast or went about their chores.
“Woke up this morning at 9:30 am to loud crashing sounds & when I looked out my front door I saw PA state police all over my street,” tweeted Sherry Wetzel Zellers.
State police said officers attempted to pull Zaborowski over at the intersection of East Washington and Second streets at around 9:30 a.m.
That’s a stone’s throw from Amanda Scarl’s home. She heard two or three shots fired as she was getting out of her car. The sound was so unfamiliar to her that she dismissed it as fireworks, until she saw a police car with blaring siren “come flying down Main Street,” she said. Shortly afterwards, she saw two more police cars and an ambulance drive by.
She checked Facebook to see if anyone knew what was happening and saw posts about a shooting.
“That kind of stuff doesn’t happen here, so it didn’t even dawn on me it could be a shooting,” she said.
State police said officers administered first aid to Zaborowski, who was treated at the scene by Northern Valley EMS and then transported to the Slatington Airport, where he was flown to St. Luke’s University Hospital in Fountain Hill.