ENCORE: After Holdup, Questions Linger About Hookah Shop's Place in Quaint Valley Junction

A week after a bullet from a pierced the usual noise of Valley Junction – bells on shop doors, an occasional siren and the chatter of a busy street – many shopkeepers wondered what, if anything, could be done about .

They say the hookah shop – or, some alleged with a wink, drug paraphernalia head shop – has attracted an unwanted element to a district just celebrated for its charm with a Award.

They weren’t happy, but they wore their worry invisibly, keeping up appearnces.

All along Fifth Street, where the mom-and-pop businesses stand shoulder to shoulder often with only thin walls separating them, open doors invited folks in without so much as the effort that it takes to turn a door handle. That’s Valley Junction’s oomph, it’s appeal. It’s known as a safe place, for everyone from a newborn up to an octogenarian.

The crime shattered that, if just for an instant. Shopkeepers were shaken and stunned.

What, if any, action do you think police, Valley Junction officials and other authorities should take regarding Fortune Gifts? Tell us below in comments.

Executive Director Jim Miller said the that ensued when Fortune Gifts owner Zamir Azam and his friend, Joe Lipichok, chased down and fought with 18-year-old Jacob William Nielsen of Des Moines, who now faces first-degree robbery charges, put lives at risk when the gun discharged.

The May 8 incident is an aberration, Miller said, still turning the “what if’s” over in his mind. What if the attempted robbery had occurred two days later, as the streets teemed with vendors and early arrivals to the weekly farmers’ market?

“This could have been a terrible situation, tragic for everyone involved – whether the suspect or the shopkeepers or someone walking down the street,” he said. “With all due respect with the choice they made, I don’t think it’s a good idea to chase after a suspect with a weapon.

“I understand the response, but I don’t recommend that,” Miller said. “Something needs to be done,” he said.

But what?

Are City Officials' Hands Tied? Should They Be Untied?

and city officials say Zamir Azam and his brother, Zafar, are operating a legal business and are in compliance with zoning regulations.

Zamir Azam says people who call his business a “head shop” are ignorant and the hookah pipes are intended for tobacco use only.

“What people do with them is none of our business,” he said.

Using the city’s law against drug paraphernalia to shut down the business would be a “hard slog,” City Attorney Dick Scieszinski said. “We’d have to prove it’s being used exclusively for drugs.”

Azam says he and his brother have kept current with laws and have removed products such as K-2, a synthetic marijuana with a legal use in aromatherapy, when they are scheduled as controlled substances.

“We obey the law,” Azam said. “We have never been in trouble, like some businesses, like gas stations that carry K-2. We carried K-2 when it was good to carry it, but as laws got passed, we stopped.”

There also doesn’t appear to be a clamor among the general public to shut down the business, Mayor Steve Gaer said.

Until last week’s attempted robbery, Gaer said he hadn’t heard “one thing from citizens about that business."

"If people are concerned about that type of store being in West Des Moines, they haven’t expressed it," he said.

“It’s not the fault of the proprietors that they got held up and burglarized,” said Ward I Councilman Kevin Trevillyan, Valley Junction’s representative on the West Des Moines City Council. “I don’t know how you would blame them that they’ve created a nuisance. There’s a lot of activity they have no control over.”

Trevillyan thinks the city’s hands are tied – and he’s not sure they should be untied.

“With bars, if we have an activity going on inside, that could be a reason to withhold or not renew a liquor license,” he said. “We don’t license businesses operating within the bounds of the law.”

Precedent Exists; Miller Thinks It’s Time to Evoke It

Gaer said the city may be able to flex its muscle if public safety becomes an issue.

He said there’s some precedent for that related to disturbances involving weapons at the after-hours club The Boom Boom Room, which operated at 3200 Westown Parkway until two years ago when city officials convinced owner Tom Baldwin he might be better off moving it.

“After so many police incidents, our position was that we need to get this resolved, so we talked to the landlord and they eventually went out,” he said.

Scieszinski said that while armed robbery can occur anywhere, “if it gets to the point that a use or a business in a community becomes a public safety concern, it’s something we need to look into.

“We have a recent precedent if it rises to a level that generates concern, and we can do what we can to try to to take care of it,” he said.

Miller thinks criminal activity related to the store has risen to the level of a public nuisance and the city may have some authority.

Since Fortune Gifts opened in July 2010, merchandise has been lifted about nine times and the shop has been burglarized about half a dozen times, the last time earlier this month.

Miller said the answer may be in working with Fortune Gifts’ landlord, Valley Junction matriarch Junction Properties.

“They’re looking at their options,” he said. “Legally, beyond a lease, there are very limited options of what can happen.

“These Kids Are Not Thinking Right”

“It’s not an illegal business. Yes, there’s a long list of police calls since they moved here – many more than in any other business in the district or in the entire district. I do think other merchants and business owners are concerned about this.”

Next door, Nick Ziemann said the tattoo parlor he manages has been operating in Valley Junction for 13 years and hadn’t been robbed until Fortune Gifts moved into the district. Not only has been broken into, he said, but so have and , a pet grooming service.

The businesses are housed under a common roof, Ziemann said, and burglars crawled through the duct work to access the different shops.

Like Miller, Ziemann doesn’t like how Azam and his friend handled the situation. “Someone could have been killed,” he said. “You have to worry about something like that. This is not the kind of community where you expect that.”

Azam defended his and Lipichok’s actions.

Nielsen was wearing mask, but Azam said he could tell by his “movements and gestures” that he and his friend could detain him until police arrived.

“These are kids who are not thinking right,” Azam said of the alleged robber and others who have committed property crimes against Fortune Gifts. “If he had been a 30-year-old, I don’t think I would have done anything about it, but looking at him, judging his character, I could tell he didn’t know how to use that thing (the gun).”