Queens deli worker grazed in head by bullet during robbery
JAMAICA, Queens (WABC) -- A Queens deli owner is speaking out after a violent caught-on-camera robbery that ended with shots fired and a clerk nearly killed.
It happened Saturday at the Gourmet Deli on Sutphin Boulevard in Jamaica.
The bullet pierced a plastic case where they keep the bread, grazing a worker who was standing there.
"We'd never expect that kind of thing, to be honest with you," owner Mike Azookari said.
He told Eyewitness News he's still shocked to learn what happened to one of his clerks.
"(He's) very lucky," he said. "I mean, think about it. Thank God."
Surveillance video shows three men with their faces partially covered entering the store just after midnight.
One of them displayed a gun and demanded money, and when the 27-year-old clerk refused, the gunman fired before they all ran out of the store.
The clerk was grazed in the head and was treated and released at a nearby hospital.
Azookari says in the future, he'll tell his employees not to put up a fight.
"I think that's the best idea," Azookari said. "Money sometimes save your life, anybody will do that."
Police say there was a fourth person stationed outside the store keeping a lookout, and they released an image of the suspects outside the store.
Anyone with information in regard to this incident is asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).
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