A 26-year-old Germantown man is facing armed robbery and multiple firearm charges after police say he arranged to buy a phone outside a Gaithersburg 7-Eleven, struck the seller in the head with a handgun, and fled with two phones. Malcolm Anderson was arrested nearly two weeks after the alleged attack, and detectives say a search of his home turned up a gun reported stolen out of state and modified to fire fully automatically.
According to WJLA, the robbery happened on October 17 outside a 7-Eleven in the 19700 block of Frederick Road in Gaithersburg. Montgomery County police said Anderson had arranged to meet the seller in the store's parking lot to buy a phone, but instead allegedly hit the seller in the head with a handgun and made off with both the phone he was supposed to purchase and the seller's personal device.
Arrest Came Nearly Two Weeks Later
Police said Anderson was taken into custody at his Germantown home on October 30, roughly 13 days after the alleged robbery. The station's report notes that detectives executed a search of the home as part of the investigation, turning up evidence tied to the case along with the firearm.
That handgun, according to the same account, had reportedly been reported stolen out of Georgia and was modified to fire fully automatically.
Charges Include Rapid-Fire Device Count
Anderson now faces charges including armed robbery, possession of a firearm by a person with a prior felony conviction, possession of a stolen regulated firearm, and possession of a rapid-fire trigger activator, among related offenses, per the WJLA report. Maryland law, as laid out in statute text published by the Maryland General Assembly, defines a rapid fire activator as a device that, when installed in or attached to a firearm, increases the rate at which the trigger is activated or increases the rate of fire.
It is not clear from available records whether the modified handgun found at Anderson's home has been formally determined to meet that statutory definition, or how the case has proceeded since his arrest. Montgomery County police have handled other armed robbery cases tied to in-person sales meetups in the past, including an armed robbery reported after a buyer and seller met to complete an online sale, and a 2023 commercial armed robbery inside a Germantown 7-Eleven.
