Nashville Store Owner Exchanges Gunshots With 2 Armed Robbers

A night on the job became violent for two Nashville, Tennessee convenience store clerks when two men walked in, guns in hand Tuesday. A wild shootout unfolded inside the very close quarters of the Lewis Street Market. On Wednesday, store owner Kamil Alakabi described what happened. "I was right here when I grabbed my gun. They stayed on the other side, and I shot them on this side," said Alakabi. "They came straight to me, and they don't say nothing. They just put the gun in my face. When they put the gun in my face, I tried to grab his gun, and they put me on the floor, and they punched me with their gun in my shoulder."

He instantly fell to the floor and immediately tried to grab one man's gun. That's when, Alakabi said, he thinks the men were startled by another worker on the other side of the aisle. "When they saw my buddy back there, they run to him. And I grab my gun and keep shooting them. When I keep shooting them and they keep shooting me, they run away you know," Alakabi said.

As the two men ran out, bullets and smoke can be seen trailing them in the security video. "I tried to protect myself, you know," said Alakabi. Alakabi said he carries a gun because this is the third time in the past three years he's been robbed at gunpoint at his store. "The second time they come with a gun, one guy he come with a gun, then he put it in my face and the front of my register, and I grabbed his gun, too," said Alakabi of the 2009 robbery. "I know this area is a bad area."

That's why the man who served seven years in the Iraq Army usually stands outside each night keeping an eye on who is around. "But last night, I forgot. We were busy or something for some reason," said Alakabi. He now hopes police find these robbers before they hurt someone else. "I hope they got them because this is bad, bad, bad people. I hope they got them. Maybe they go to another store, they kill somebody or something. That's bad people, you know," said Alakabi. Both of the men who were trying to rob the store got away, and police said it did not appear that either was hit by the gunfire.

Source: ThisIs50