Rug-Store Owner Killed in Fashion District
A 71-year-old Iranian immigrant who owned a rug store in the Fashion District was shot and killed during an armed robbery on Oct. 23.
It was the first murder in the Fashion District since 2002, said Lt. Paul Vernon of the Los Angeles Police Department.
Ebrahim Torbati was sitting at his desk at the front of Rug City at 840 S. Santee St. when an African-American man came in to look at rugs, Vernon said.
“He came back with a gun and robbed the owner, demanding money,” Vernon said.
There was a scuffle, and the robber, aged 20 to 25 years old, shot Torbati in the neck at 4:15 p.m., Vernon said. The store owner was rushed to County-USC Hospital, where he later died, police said.
The robber fled, getting into a white Toyota Camry that was waiting with two women inside about a block away, Vernon said.
Police are looking for the below-five-foot-five-inch suspect, who was wearing a gray T-shirt and gray baseball hat when the robbery occurred. It was unclear how much money was taken.
“We will put a composite [sketch] together, and we’re running down other leads,” Vernon said, noting there was one eyewitness in the store when the robbery occurred.
Police noted that Torbati’s desk, where he kept his cash in a cardboard box, was near the store’s front door and visible to passersby. “It might be the reason for a robber to pick one business over another,” Vernon said, cautioning store owners to keep their money out of sight and farther from the front windows.
Torbati, who lived in Tarzana, Calif., came to the United States about 20 years ago. He imported Persian-style rugs from Belgium, China and Egypt. He never married and had no immediate family in the area, police said.
Friends said he had a sister in New York, who was flying to Los Angeles after she learned of her brother’s death, and another sister in Israel.
Rug City was closed the day after the murder, but someone had left a white glass candle burning on Torbati’s desk, where a bloodsplattered newspaper lay. A narrow, empty cardboard box where Torbati kept his cash sat nearby.
Merchants in the mostly Iranian enclave of Santee Street were shocked by their friend’s death.
Next door at J. & R. Textile, which sells sheets and bedspreads, owner Jacob Molaei said he was busy with a customer and didn’t hear anything until an ambulance pulled up. “I walked out, and suddenly I see my friend has been shot,” Molaei said.
Molaei had known his neighbor for about six or seven years.
“He was a happy man, talking to everyone and laughing,” he said.
Ebrahim Rafy, who had known Torbati for 10 years, had a desk inside Rug City, where he conducted his business as a middleman for fabric and other goods.
Every day, he and Torbati each bought a different Persian newspaper and worked on the crossword puzzles together. Rafy left the store at 2 p.m., before the armed robbery occurred, but got a call at 5 p.m. that his friend had been shot.
“I can’t believe he’s dead,” Rafy said. “I couldn’t sleep all night. I felt he was talking to me, working on a crossword puzzle.”
Anyone with information about the robbery and murder can call LAPD Det. Al Marengo at (213) 972-1249.—Deborah Belgum
