Store Owner, 12-Year-Old Son Held At Gunpoint In Yonkers Robbery
YONKERS, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) -- A family was on edge Friday after a robbers held a 12-year-old boy and his father hostage at gunpoint at a Yonkers store.
As CBS2's Lou Young reported, police were searching for three suspects in the robbery at the Yonkers Corp. Meat Market, at 135 Elm St. in Yonkers. Surveillance video taken around 9:15 p.m. Thursday showed the three suspects rushing into the meat market wearing ski masks.
Merchants along the gritty stretch said the block gets dicey after dark. The store was closed at the time of the robbery.
The robbers cased the place out, and saw the owner and his son cleaning up and getting ready to leave when they made their move, Young reported.
They put two guns in the face of the store owner and his 12-year-old son who was working with him Thursday night, police said.
"I said: 'Don't touch my son. Take what you want. Don't touch my son,'" the man's father said.
The boy, Joseph Althanaibat, spoke with CBS2 Friday afternoon. Young said Joseph was cooler, calmer and more collected than one might imagine.
"Me and my dad was working, and then three people just came in the store, and they were like, 'Put your hands up,'" he said. "It seemed like a joke. But then when I turned back, I saw two people with two guns in their hands, and they just put me on the floor and hold me down there on my head and said, 'Open the cash register.' And I said, 'I don't know how.' But then they sat on me on the floor."
Joseph said the robbers later threw the cash register to the ground and broke it.
"I'm thinking I'm about to die, because they had two guns pointed at my dad and me," he said.
Joseph is a seventh grader at P.S. 15 in Yonkers. When asked if he cried, Joseph said, "No, I'm not a baby."
The robbers got $700 from the cash register, police said. Police suspect they are from the neighborhood.
The store owner said he needs more police protection in the rough part of Yonkers where he operates.
"I appeal to the mayor and ask him, 'Please, please, please, we need your help. We need your help on the street," he said.
A representative for Mayor Mike Spano said street and car patrols have been stepped up.
