Joshua Mitchell to head to trial on gas-and-dash murder charge

Gas station attendant had been on the job for 3 days

Image | Joshua Mitchell

Caption: Police take 20-year-old Joshua Cody Mitchell, charged in the fatal hit and run death of Maryam Rashidi, into Calgary's arrest processing unit. (CBC)

The man accused of killing a Calgary gas station attendant in a hit and run last June will head directly to trial.
Joshua Mitchell was charged with second-degree murder after Maryam Rashidi was struck and killed trying to stop a driver from stealing gas.
He was supposed to go to a preliminary inquiry but the Crown prosecutor involved decided to proceed by direct indictment — meaning it would head straight to trial.

Image | Maryam Rashidi

Caption: Maryam Rashidi and her husband, Ahmad Nourani Shallo, with their son Koorosh in an undated family photo. (Rashidi family)

Rashidi, 35, was working as a gas station attendant at the Centex on 16 Avenue northwest when she chased after a driver who stole $113 in gas.
She was hit by the truck, carried on the hood and then run over. She later died in hospital.
Rashidi and her husband moved to Canada in late 2014 to work in the oil and gas industry.
Both engineers, they were laid off after just four months in Calgary, so Rashidi took the job at the Centex gas station where she had worked for just three days before she was killed.
Mitchell is also charged with possession of stolen property over $5,000 and theft under $5,000.
A date for trial has been set for April 24, 2017.