The letter laid out what happened the day a gunman flung open the door of an El Cajon dentist’s office and opened fire. Before it was over, two staffers were wounded, and the dentist was dead.
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In the letter, sent to El Cajon police in April 2025, the writer identified himself as Mohammed Abdulkareem. He wrote of complications with dental work and of frustration that the office could not help him further.
“I decided to get the dentist,” the author wrote, “because it all started with him.”
Portions of that letter were read aloud in an El Cajon courtroom Tuesday during the preliminary hearing for Abdulkareem, 31, who is accused of murder in the death of 28-year-old Dr. Benjamin Harouni and attempted murder in the shootings of two Smile Plus Dentistry & Orthodontics staffers on the afternoon of Feb. 29, 2024. The shooter fled, but authorities said staffers recognized the assailant as Abdulkareem, a dissatisfied patient. He was arrested hours later and remains in custody without bail.
At the end of the hearing, El Cajon Superior Court Judge John Thompson ordered Abdulkareem to stand trial.
The case was paused early in the proceedings after Abdulkareem’s attorney questioned his client’s mental competency, but it resumed the following year after he was evaluated and found competent. Shortly thereafter, Abdulkareem started representing himself. He faces well more than 100 years to life in prison if convicted of all charges and allegations.
During Tuesday’s hearing, prosecutors showed Thompson some of the surveillance footage caught by cameras inside and outside of the building that housed Harouni’s office.
The footage showed a person drive up in a U-Haul pickup, park and walk in, wearing dark clothing and a face mask over his mouth and nose. He then soon left the building. The El Cajon detective who edited the video said the man did that several times, lingering between the office hallway and the alley parking lot.
Finally, he walked back into the building. This time, his mask was off.
The video showed the person flinging open the office door and opening fire from the hallway. He then disappeared inside the office, and microphones caught several long, loud volleys of what sounded like gunshots seconds apart, as well as screams. Harouni died, and two office staffers — a woman in her 20s and an office manager in his 40s — were wounded.
The shooter is seen running out, with what appears to be a gun in his right hand and a firearm magazine in his left, then driving off in the pickup. El Cajon police quickly identified Abdulkareem as a suspect.
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Several hours later, a tipster, aware of the search for the shooter, reported seeing the U-Haul in Bankers Hill outside Balboa Park. San Diego police officers swarmed the site and arrested Abdulkareem. According to testimony, a search of the backpack he wore turned up a loaded gun, with a round in the chamber.
As the surveillance video was about to play in court, the judge asked Abdulkareem, who was shackled, if he’d like to be repositioned so he could view it; the screen was behind him. Abdulkareem declined and kept his back to it.
When he cross-examined witnesses, he generally kept it to one sentence — a variation of whether the police officers who were testifying had ever been found mentally incompetent or to be of diminished intellectual capacity.
According to testimony, police received several letters believed to be written by Abdulkareem, who has been jailed since his arrest. The defendant did not ask questions about the letter prosecutors introduced into evidence.
In that letter, a section of which was read aloud in court, the writer recounted going to the office and opening fire, seeing three people in the waiting room on his right and four on the left. It described shooting several rounds, including through a door being held shut.
“Still not sure how the female got shot,” the letter said. “I actually just went for the guys.”
After the hearing, Abdulkareem’s brother, Anwer, said his brother had been having hallucinations and was paranoid before the shooting, had tried twice to kill himself, and at least once was taken in for a mental health hold but released after three days. “We told them that he needs to be held and he needs help,” the brother said outside the courtroom. “No one listened.”
Harouni’s mother, Hilda Sadik Harouni, said outside the courtroom that the day was bittersweet and she was pleased to see the legal process moving forward. “This is the first time I feel like we are getting somewhere,” she said.
Harouni’s father, Jack, said he was there to represent his son — “a beautiful human being, full of love” — and to seek justice.
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No trial date has been set.
