Questions surround rampage

By 9 a.m. Thursday, a man sweeping up between the aisles and another repairing the ice cream freezer were the only signs of the pandemonium which took place Tuesday at the Petro Station at the Estherwood/Iota Exit off of Interstate 10.
Workers were stunned when a woman calmly walked into the station and knocked over shelves, pushed over displays, threw products and knocked over several coffee machines.
Video of the incident had gone viral locally on the internet as of Thursday morning with nearly 9,000 hits.
Some of the store employees were still stunned by what they saw.
“She walked in with a knife and just began to push things over,” said a female clerk who wouldn’t be identified. “I got scared and went outside until it was over. Eventually, she walked out of the side door towards the woods in back of the store and that’s where she was arrested. I think she had just got into a fight and came in here to vent her anger.”
Another male employee said that the estimated damage was in the neighborhood of $50,000.
“Just the coffee machines alone and the display with some of the glass products we sell costs us about $20,000,” he said.
However, the responding officials are unsure about part of the witnesses version of events.
“You’ve seen the video. Did you see that woman holding a knife?” asked Acadia Parish Sheriff’s Office Detective Pat Kirsch.
After looking through the video, it appears as though the woman, who has been identified as Laquisha Delray, no hometown given, is not holding a knife while she was being recorded by several witnesses, none of whom seem to feel threatened by her. And at no point in the video did she appear to threaten anyone in the store.
However, there was a portion of the spree where nobody was recording her that obviously can’t be substantiated.
Kirsch also was unsure whether any fight took place prior to Delray’s rampage.
“We have nothing about a fight,” he said. “It’s possible she just snapped.”
Chad Fontenot, who works for a company called Chilly’s, was unaware of the situation and only knew that he was sent Thursday morning to repair the ice cream machine.
“I didn’t know what happened until I got here this morning,” he said. “I’m looking forward to seeing the video for myself.”
The woman was part of a group that had been traveling on a Mega Bus that stopped at the Petro Station on Tuesday. It was unclear as of press time who the woman was fighting with or if or where any such fight occurred.
Delray remains in the Acadia Parish Correctional Facility. She was booked with one count of simple criminal damage to property (carrying a $15,000 bond) and counts of two simple battery ($500 bond for each).