Milan Street carjacking victim shoots attacker; two suspects arrested afterward, police say

Andrew Spikes (via NOPD)

Jonah Marco (via NOPD)

A carjacking victim on Milan Street managed to shoot one of his attackers early Sunday morning, and both the injured suspect and his alleged getaway driver were identified and arrested shortly afterward, New Orleans police said.

The victims — one man in his 50s and the other in his 60s — had parked in the 1000 block of Milan Street around 1:45 a.m. Sunday, Dec. 10, and were heading home when they were confronted by two masked strangers, each armed with a handgun, New Orleans police said. One of the gunmen demanded the car while the other assailant forced the older man to the ground, the report states.

The older man had a gun in his own hand, however, and he began to struggle with his attacker, the report states. During the struggle, the victim fired his gun into the stomach of his attacker, and the injured attacker then withdrew and ran off on foot toward Camp Street, dropping his gun as he departed, the report states. The other assailant then got into the victim’s car and left, the report states.

The carjacking victim who fired the shots was 63-year-old U.S. Navy veteran Bennie Sideboerd, who told our partners at WWL-TV that his gun had five bullets, and it was the fifth shot that connected at close range:

Witnesses told police they saw a man possibly matching the description of the injured carjacker getting into a car waiting near Milan and Camp streets and being driven away, the report states.

About a half hour later, NOPD detectives learned that teen suffering from a gunshot wound to the stomach had arrived at the hospital, the report states. At the hospital, they found 21-year-old Jonah Marco, who had driven 17-year-old Andrew Spikes there for treatment of a gunshot wound, the report states. Spikes was identified as the person who was shot by the carjacking victim, and “Marco was implicated as having driven Spikes and the second suspect to the location to allegedly commit the carjacking,” the report states.

Marco was arrested on a charge of accessory after the fact to armed robbery with a firearm, and Spikes was arrested on two counts of armed robbery with a firearm and booked into jail after being released from the hospital, the report states.

“The second armed carjacking suspect remains at large,” the report states. “Based on evidence uncovered during this investigation, detectives are also investigating the possibility of Marco, Spikes and additional suspects possibly being involved in additional armed robberies in the city.”