Leer en espa\u00f1ol<\/a><\/p>\nJail records show Rafael Issac Rodriguez, 27, was arrested Monday by the Hialeah Police Department and is facing one count of armed robbery with a firearm or deadly weapon and one count of attempted armed robbery with a firearm and mask. <\/p>\n
The first incident happened shortly before 1 a.m. Friday at Palm Smoke, located at 907 Palm Ave., according to investigators. <\/p>\n
Police said Rodriguez entered the store wearing a dark-colored hoodie and light-colored pants and walked behind the glass countertop, an area restricted to employees. <\/p>\n
One of his hands was inside his hoodie, leading the cashier to believe he was armed with a gun, the report states.<\/p>\n
Police said Rodriguez approached the cashier and demanded pills.<\/p>\n
The cashier told detectives he recognized Rodriguez as a regular customer and as one of only two customers who purchased the specific type of pills being demanded, according to the report.<\/p>\n
Fearing for his life, the cashier grabbed a hookah pick for protection and told Rodriguez he was not giving him anything and that he needed to leave, the report states. <\/p>\n
Rodriguez then told him, \u201cYou are lucky this is unloaded,\u201d before leaving the store and driving away in a dark-colored Ford Taurus, according to the report.<\/p>\n
About 45 minutes later, Rodriguez returned wearing the same clothing, but this time carrying a semiautomatic rifle equipped with a 100-round drum magazine, police said. <\/p>\n
They said Rodriguez entered the business, pulled the rifle\u2019s charging handle, loaded a round into the chamber and pointed the weapon at the cashier while again demanding the pills.<\/p>\n
The cashier ran into a small office area inside the store for cover, police said.<\/p>\n
They said Rodriguez then went to the area where the pills were stored and took approximately $1,600 worth of pills identified in the report as containing pure 7-hydroxymitragynine, commonly known as 7-OH.<\/p>\n
He then left the store and fled northbound on Palm Avenue, according to police.<\/p>\n
The cashier provided detectives with information identifying Rodriguez, including a phone number and email address from previous transactions, the report states. Detectives later identified Rodriguez and presented the cashier with a photo lineup.<\/p>\n
The cashier identified Rodriguez as the person involved in both incidents, according to the report.<\/p>\n
Rodriguez was located around 7:40 p.m. Monday near Northwest 10th Avenue and Northwest 20th Street and was taken to Hialeah Police Department headquarters for an interview, the report states.<\/p>\n
After being advised of his Miranda rights, Rodriguez agreed to speak with detectives, according to police.<\/p>\n
During the interview, Rodriguez said he drives a 2010 blue Ford Taurus and acknowledged that he is addicted to 7-hydroxymitragynine, or 7-OH, the report states.<\/p>\n
Rodriguez also told detectives he frequently shops at Palm Smoke and knows attendants working both shifts, investigators said. <\/p>\n
Rodriguez claimed he was \u201cexperiencing withdrawals\u201d and said he did not remember where he was or what he did at the time of the robbery, according to the report.<\/p>\n
Rodriguez later asked for a lawyer, and detectives ended the interview, the report states. <\/p>\n
As the Miranda form was being completed, Rodriguez made a spontaneous statement about the shop selling Schedule I substances, saying, \u201cI\u2019m the one getting f—ed over,\u201d the report states. <\/p>\n
As of Tuesday morning, he was being held at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center, where his bond was listed as to be set.” <\/p>\n
\ud83c\udfe0 News From Your Neighborhood<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by WPLG Local10.com – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HIALEAH, Fla. \u2014 A man is accused of first trying to rob a Hialeah smoke shop before returning…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":387316,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[225,227,226],"class_list":["post-387315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-hialeah","tag-hialeah","tag-hialeah-headlines","tag-hialeah-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=387315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387315\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/387316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=387315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=387315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=387315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}