Saturday night was already peculiar for Akasha Market owner Rania Ahmed because her 15-year-old son wanted to sleep in her bed instead of his own.

They fell asleep together at midnight, and Ahmed woke up at 5:24 a.m. to a hand covering her mouth and a gun to her head. One man demanded she “give up” the money while another held her son at gunpoint.

East Baton Rouge District Attorney Hillar Moore said he heard about the robbery, but has not met with Ahmed.

He said they are still gathering information on Isaac, as well as other people potentially associated with this crime and the previous, related crimes.

Moore said this robbery was an anomaly.

He said it has been fairly quiet over the past two months, but the “extreme” home invasion was very disturbing.

“I’ve been here 40 years,” he said. “I’ve seen everything, a whole lot worse than this. But this is bad.”

Moore said the main perpetrator, who may be the same as the Jan. 4 robber, is still at large.

Moore said it is possible that the home invader and the Akasha Market robber are associated with one another or the same person, but no one knows for sure. He said the police are working very hard on the case.

Ahmed said she believes the man who held her at gunpoint was the same man that robbed her store in Tigerland almost a month ago. She said he wore the same clothes, brandished the same gun and spoke in the same voice as the robber from early January.

“My story’s like the movies, I swear to God,” she said. “But this is what happened.”

Ahmed said she told him she did not have money.  

Ahmed said the second perpetrator duct-taped her son’s legs and hands together and cut his forearm with a pocketknife in front of her.

One of the robbers dragged Ahmed’s 17-year-old daughter from her bedroom and into Ahmed’s, where he beat her face, breaking her braces and loosening a tooth. Ahmed said blood came out of her mouth.

Ahmed said they also tied her daughter’s arms behind her back and legs together with duct tape and then punched her again.

Ahmed said one of the men found her 12-year-old son sleeping on the couch in the office. He punched the boy in his chest and walked him to Ahmed’s room with the gun to his head.

All of her children except for her oldest daughter were gathered in Ahmed’s room.

The robbers took Ahmed to her oldest daughter’s’ room, the door to which was locked. Her oldest daughter was hiding inside.

Ahmed said the perpetrator broke the door, dragged her oldest daughter out and demanded to know if she had called someone. Ahmed said they hit her over the head with the gun.

She said they told her son, “If you guys don’t turn out the money, it’s going to get ugly over here.”

But the men backed out of the house with their guns cocked and fled as the police arrived.

Ahmed said one ran into a neighbor’s backyard, dropping his gun and her oldest daughter’s phone. She said police officers tased and captured him.

BRPD spokesperson Don Coppola said Lawrence Isaac, 20, was arrested in relation to the incident. Isaac’s arrestee information form shows he was arrested for armed robbery and resisting an officer on Sunday, Jan. 31.

According to the arrestee information form, Isaac fled the home with the PlayStation 4 and two wallets, leading police on a foot chase before being taken into custody. Officers recovered a firearm next door to Ahmed’s residence.

Ahmed said the robbers also stole video games and her purse full of credit cards, checks, a gold ring and other miscellaneous items.

The “dangerous one,” who Ahmed said she thinks is the same man who robbed her at her store, fled into the woods. She said there was probably a third man who drove them that she never saw.

Coppola said the investigation is ongoing.

Ahmed said there was no money in her safe or her purse, and she thinks that was what the robbers primarily wanted.

They got nothing,” she said. “It’s stupid.”

She said she thinks the robbers planned to tie them all up with duct tape and beat them until they gave up the money.

Ahmed said she is bothered not by the fact that they stole from her, but that they terrorized her and her children.

 No neighbors saw or heard anything, she said.

 After the home robbery, Ahmed said she met with a member of the District Attorney’s office, who asked her some questions about Tigerland. She told him that two years ago, when crime began escalating in the area, she went on TV urging police to place more officers and cameras around the neighborhood.

She said officials admitted she knew things before everyone else and they are now aware and taking it seriously, putting more special forces in the area.

“A college area should be nice,” she said. “It shouldn’t be like this.”

Ahmed said she wants to stay away from these problems, which is why she left the store in the first place. She said she has never had problems with anyone like this before.

Since giving up the store, she said, she has not left the house. She has been cooking, cleaning and taking care of her kids.

Being robbed twice in one month and giving up her store of 20 years, she said, has been strange.

“This is something that changed my life,” she said.

Ahmed said she expected the robber to come back to her store, but never to her house. She said she feels hopeless because she leased the store for the safety of her children.

 She said she expected more security and support from her community.

 “But nobody cares,” she said. “That’s why they come and attack me again.”

 She still called surviving the Sunday morning attack a miracle.

“We are lucky we are alive,” she said.

Ahmed said her 17 year-old daughter now has a broken jaw.

 When visiting her daughter at the hospital last night, Ahmed said people told her they heard about the story of the original robbery.

 She said people have reached out to her on Facebook because they are sad about her leasing the store. She said the store is an integral part of the University’s culture and she is the kind of person who loves to give.

“It’s my nature,” she said. “I cannot change it.”

 Ahmed said the lessee began his 10-year lease of the store and has already updated the store to include new wood, glass and a granite countertop.

 She plans on moving out of her house not for the neighborhood but for the bad memories.

Ahmed said she now has security protection at her home, including guns, alarms, private security and police patrols.

The single mother said she has raised her children alone since 2011.

“This really would terrify any person,” she said. “Even the strongest person.”