2 Fast-Food Robbers Now Prey on Markets

BUENA PARK —  Two men suspected of robbing at least 30 fast-food restaurants in the Southland during the past five months have apparently started holding up supermarkets and drugstores, police said Thursday.

“It’s the same (mode of operation), same suspect description, and same weapons being used,” Police Sgt. Terry Branum said.

The lastest robbery occurred Wednesday at 8:30 p.m. at a Thrifty Drug Store in Buena Park when two men burst into the store, pointed handguns and demanded that all eight customers lay on the floor, police said.

One of the gunmen took an employee to the back room and told him to open the safe, Branum said.

“He told the employee, ‘If you don’t get it right the first time, I’ll kill you.’ The employee said he was pretty nervous but was able to get it open on the first try,” Branum said.

Meanwhile, the other gunman made another employee open up the cash registers, Branum said.

The gunmen fled with about $700, he said. No shots were fired, and no one was injured.

Police believe that the same gunmen robbed an Albertson’s Food Center in the same area about a month ago, Branum said.

Police have had problems catching the gunmen because of their “takeover” style of holdups. The gunmen are usually in and out of a store “in a matter of minutes,” Branum said.

Branum said the gunmen should be considered very dangerous. “It doesn’t take much to set them off,” he said.

Initially, the gunmen confined their activities to fast-food restaurants. During those robberies, they would enter the establishment, order customers to the floor and raid the cash registers. Such robberies have been reported mostly in Buena Park and Cypress, but have also occurred in La Mirada, Downey, Santa Fe Springs, Norwalk and Bellflower in Los Angeles County.

Police have only sketchy descriptions of the gunmen. In most of the robberies, a chrome handgun and a blue steel handgun have been used.