It started with a woman in disguise demanding money at the counter of a Wolcott gas station, but ended with the clerk holding her down to the ground until police arrived.
“She tried to rob me once, you’re not going anywhere,” 26-year-old Mohamed Aburkhis said. “I’m gonna catch you and give you to the police.”
Wolcott Police are crediting Aburkhis, a clerk at the Shell gas station on Wolcott Road, with helping them arrest a robbery suspect Tuesday night.
At first, Aburkhis said he was not alarmed when the robber in a hooded sweatshirt with her face covered walked into the store around 6:30 p.m.
“Not even paying attention to her, get out of here,” he said, “Until she started yelling. You can’t tell it’s a woman anyways the way she was yelling.”
But then, Aburkhis said she made a gesture in her pocket like she was potentially armed with a gun. A store surveillance camera also captured the robber handing over a plastic bag.
“She said, give me all the money, all the money you have,” Aburkhis said.
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But he did not turn over any cash.
After the robber exited the store, Aburkhis chased her behind the store and tackled her to the ground. Moments after the takedown, a passerby called Wolcott’s 911.
“Behind the Shell gas station, I need someone here now,” the frantic caller said. “I have someone pinned on the ground.”
“The only time I was able to let her go was when police came in, she was fighting the whole time, kicking me, just trying to run away,” Aburkhis said.
Police identified the robbery suspect as 36-year-old Seana Malone. She is charged with first degree robbery, sixth degree criminal attempt at larceny and second degree breach of peace. Police say she has a criminal history.
“We’re very lucky here,” Wolcott Police Chief Edward Stephens said. “If that in fact was a gun, we’d talk about a different story here. I do not advise it, it did work out this time and we got the bad guy, nobody else got hurt.”
Now, other robbers know not to mess with the clerk at the Shell gas station on Wolcott Road.
“Why did you have that instinct to go after her?” NBC Connecticut asked.
“I don’t know, she tried to do that,” Aburkhis said, “I don’t want her to go somewhere else.”
Turns out Aburkhis was actually armed with a gun the whole time, he said.
Aburkhis' bond was set at $25,000.