Police arrest suspect in downtown stabbing

Police arrested a man suspected of stabbing and killing another man early Tuesday at a downtown Spokane 7-Eleven after a fight broke out in the parking lot.

Using video surveillance footage, police identified the suspect as 29-year-old Andre A. Conway. Officers found and arrested him near Sprague Avenue and Browne Street at about 12:30 p.m., according to a news release.

Conway will appear in court Wednesday.

The victim’s identity has not been made public pending notification of family. Conway is suspected of stabbing him at about 2:30 a.m. outside the convenience store and gas station on the corner of Second Avenue and Division Street.

By the time police officers got to the scene of the fight, “the large group had cleared out,” said John O’Brien, spokesman for the Spokane Police Department. “They found a male in the parking lot with a stab wound.”

O’Brien said officers performed CPR and called for medics, but the man was pronounced dead at the scene. By 8 a.m., a representative with the Spokane County Medical Examiner’s Office was photographing the body as part of the investigation.

Conway has a lengthy criminal record dating back to his teen years. It includes convictions for assault, theft, escape from community custody, robbery, resisting arrest and other crimes.

A rival gang member attempted to shoot him in 2011 during Hoopfest, according to newspaper reports. Three bystanders were injured instead, with at least two needing hospital treatment for minor wounds.

Police have expressed frustration with drug activity and fights occurring at the 7-Eleven. The owner has received multiple citations for failing to keep an abatement agreement he signed with the police department.

The store’s owner, Kahar Momand, said in an interview in August that he loses more than $100 a day to shoplifting. He said he spent more than $20,000 hiring a private security company and installing cameras and a device that makes a high-pitched ringing outside the front door to dissuade people from congregating.

Momand said in August that he preferred calling his security company rather than 911 because he keeps receiving citations.

Reached by phone Tuesday, the owner said he was out of town and didn’t know much about what happened, including whether his store’s surveillance cameras would have captured the area of the parking lot where the fight broke out.

“I don’t have any information on that right now,” he said. “I don’t know anything about it.”

Will Campbell contributed to this report