Tonight, an armed robber is in hospital recovering from a gunshot injury he received from his own weapon. That's after he held up a gas station in Belmopan, and one of the unarmed but fearless pump attendants chased him down and caught him.
That may sound like fiction, and for some of our viewers, the details may even have some elements of comedy in it. But yesterday afternoon, it was no joke when the lives of innocent employees from the Buca Service Station were put at risk by this armed thief who recklessly discharged his weapon in public.
Our news team has been following the story, and Daniel Ortiz examines the incident with surveillance footage provided by the business owners. Here's his report:
Daniel Ortiz reporting
Footage captured by the gas station's surveillance system shows the robber walking onto the BUCA Shell compound just after 1:00 yesterday afternoon.
He then goes into the gas station's convenience store, where he approaches the on-duty cashier as if he is just another ordinary customer.
Kristy Hulse - Acting Manager, BUCA Gas Station
"He came in as an unsuspecting customer asking for a brake fluid and so the clerk went to get that and coming back with the brake fluid she saw he had the gun and that's when he demanded the cash from her."
The camera catches him slyly slipping a handgun from his waist, while the cashier is distracted, and when she comes back, he keeps the handgun below the counter, like an innocent customer.
He then makes his move and goes behind the counter, but it appears that the cashier surprises with the item he requested to purchase, and so he immediately turns around, and orders her to hand over whatever money is in the register.
The cashier nervously complies, clearly taking into account that he has this weapon out, and she hands over all the dollar bills.
She then pulls out all the dollar coins and shillings in the register, which then dumps on the countertop. He then clumsily tries to collect all of them, and then orders her to open other drawers nearby to see what other valuables he can steal.
He then dashes out the front door, to the pump area where he immediately goes to one of the gas station pump attendants, and they have an inaudible exchange.
The family business owners tell us that this was when he was robbing the attendants.
Reporter
"Did he actually get any money from any of the gas pump attendant as well?"
Kristy Hulse - Acting Manager, BUCA Gas Station
"Yes, we weren't sure how much he had on themselves at the time. But we know from the store he went with over $300, but from the has attendants we dont know how much they had until they work out their shift to see more or less how much is missing."
The surveillance footage catches him when he drags one of the pump attendants over to his colleague, and it appears that he then robs both.
He then goes over to a customer's vehicle who's trying purchase fuel, and it appears that he is attempting to hold that person hostage to drive him away from the scene of the crime.
The customer then jumps out of vehicle, and the robber then sprints off at another customer not seen in the frame, with his gun pointed, firing shots. We're told that this customer also gets out of the way, and surprisingly, the robber does not attempt to jump into the vehicle.
Instead, he then runs to the roadside, attempting to cut off that yellow car approaching from the left of your screen. Notice that one of the gas pump attendants runs off, and that's when he jumps into his own vehicle, intending to set chase.
But, the robber's unraveling escape plan continues to fall apart, as he fires his gun near the yellow vehicle, whose driver speeds away.
He still hasn't given up yet, and he attempts to stop a red Mahindra pickup coming the opposite direction, and the vehicle swerves out of his way, while he's in the middle of the road.
He then runs away to the other side of the road, attempting to flee on foot, and the gas station pump attendants then speeds out of the gas station compound, chasing after him.
Kristy Hulse - Acting Manager, BUCA Gas Station
"From the footage we see that after robbing the 2 attendants he tried to get into 2 vehicles, but it seems as he got in on the passengers' side of one, the driver jumps out. So he then jumped out of that and tried with another vehicle, but the same thing happened. So then he ran off on foot to the medical center back on Garbutt Creek Street and when he was running off he tried to stop 2 other vehicles; a yellow car and a red Mahindra, but the red Mahindra managed to swerve around him and then he continued running down that street and that's when our employee he jumped in his vehicle and pursued him."
Reporter
"Now Ma'am, all this while this person is firing live rounds right?"
Kristy Hulse
"Yes, about I think 8 got off because he was firing at vehicles for him to get away."
That gas station pump attendant, who you saw speeding away to chase the robber down, managed to single-handedly detain the armed thief, even though he was unarmed.
Kristy Hulse - Acting Manager, BUCA Gas Station
"Once he got into his vehicle to chase him down, he manages to run him in and that's caused the guy to break his windshield and from there he got out of his vehicle and there was a struggle between them and I guess that's when the gun went off and the guy shot himself."
Reporter
"It's rather unusual that victims of a robbery would go after the suspect like that. Did you all expected that?"
Kristy Hulse - Acting Manager, BUCA Gas Station
"Well we definitely didn't expect that. We haven't really experience a robbery since Buca has been here, but we always tell the employees in case of an event to preserve your life, you just give them the money and then call the police as soon as you could. We didn't expect them to pursue the robber."
Reporter
"Fortunately this particular attendant has training."
Kristy Hulse - Acting Manager, BUCA Gas Station
"Yes, before he was an attendant he was a security guard and before that he had training in the BDF Special Force Unit. Everybody was shaken up at the time. Things seem to have calm down now, but we were still on alert, because things in the country is getting worse and I know we've heard several other PUMA gas stations and SOL, Shell and different gas stations have been getting held up. So we have to be on the lookout` for that."
Reporter
"Did you guys manage to get back the cash that he tried to steal?"
Kristy Hulse - Acting Manager, BUCA Gas Station
"Yes, the police managed to get it from him, so they should be delivering that back to us later."
The staff at the gas station tell us that they spotted this person about 2 weeks ago, roaming near the gas station, pretending to pick up pint bottles. They believe that he was using that as an opportunity to plan his heist.
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