Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, April 14, 1990 TAG: 9004140343
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Eddie Thomas Pritchard, a cashier at the Hop-In store at 931 Gus Nicks Boulevard, was listed in stable condition Friday night at Roanoke Memorial Hospital.
Pritchard told police that he was alone in the all-night store about 1:38 a.m. when two men came in. One of the men was carrying a small-caliber handgun.
After brandishing the gun, the man fired several shots - striking Pritchard once in the upper left side, police said.
The men then took an undetermined amount of money from the store and fled, police said.
When police officers arrived a few minutes later, Pritchard was still on his feet. He told police that he did nothing to provoke the shooting.
Police checked out several possible leads following the shooting, but no arrests had been made by late Friday.
The incident was the latest in a rash of convenience store robberies in Roanoke that have led to violence. One clerk shot and killed an armed robber earlier this year and another fired shots at a fleeing bandit.
Clerks at Hop-In stores are not allowed to carry guns on the job, according to Bill Chase, the head of a subsidiary company that owns the store chain in Roanoke.
"We think that provokes situations more often than not," Chase said. In the event of an armed robbery, employees are instructed hand over money with no resistance - a policy that Pritchard apparently followed, Chase said.
Pritchard had been working at the store for just three weeks. Although convenience stores in some parts of town have had problems with repeated robberies, Chase said there had been no serious problems at the Gus Nicks Boulevard store.
Authorities said Friday that they were investigating the possibility that the same two robbers were involved in an earlier holdup of another Roanoke convenience store about 9:10 p.m. Thursday.
In that robbery, two men fitting the same basic description entered the Stop-In store at 1605 Hershberger Road. The clerk told police that one of the robbers pointed a large-caliber handgun at her and demanded money. After taking a small amount of cash, the men fled in the direction of Grandview Avenue, police said.
Police said that "although many factors differ" in the two robberies, they have not discounted the possibility that the same men were involved in both holdups.
Authorities were searching for two suspects described as follows:
A white male in his 20s or 30s, about 6 feet 2, with long, dark hair and wearing a plaid shirt, blue jeans and a baseball cap.
The other suspect was described as a white male in his early 20s, with a small build, brown hair, and wearing a Harley Davidson T-shirt and blue jeans.
by CNB