Family store manager held at gunpoint
'They then walked past the security guard while announcing it was a robbery. One of them pulled out a firearm.'
Four robbers held employees and customers at gunpoint in Ackersmans in Monument Street on Wednesday, 7 September.
Store manager Jeritta Mooki, who was in the thick of things, said the men entered the store at about 3pm and asked security staff where the cellphones were, but the security guard didn’t seem to understand what they were asking.
“They then walked past the security guard while announcing it was a robbery. One of them pulled out a firearm,” Mooki said. The robbers demanded her and another employee to take them to the store room where the cellphones were being kept. In the store room the men started throwing the new phones into a bag.
“I am glad they were too preoccupied to notice that I had dropped the key to the door on the floor and was shielding it with my body,” Mooki said.
The robbers then locked the two women in the store room and fled the scene with cellphones to the value of about R60 000.
“When I heard the other employees knocking on the door, I slid the key underneath and they unlocked it.”
Mooki claimed it was not the first time Ackermans had been targeted. “We experienced the same type of robberies in the past year.”
The employees had a counselling session the next day. Mooki is to attend a security improvement meeting soon where plans will be devised to make the business safer.
“We are still in shock, but we have no choice but to keep working here because employment is scarce,” Mooki said.
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