HALETHORPE, Md. — On Tuesday night, 15 de Septiembre, a Salvadoran bar and restaurant in Halethorpe, remained open for business when police say three men forced their way in through a door in the back.
The restaurant’s owner confronted them as they came through the kitchen and one of them shot him in the upper body.
John Littleton of Brooklyn visits the shopping center routinely to get his hair cut next door.
“I think that there is a greater level of gang violence moving in,” said Littleton. “It becomes a dangerous environment and later at night when the lights go out and the stores close, it’s just a congregation of people not looking to be upstanding so it becomes a toxic environment where people can get caught in the cross hairs of some dangerous behavior.”
The victim’s daughter tells us three customers and employees came to help the owner as the intruders ran from the business.
“I don’t know if they were targeted,” said Baltimore County Police Det. Robert Reason. “I don’t even know if it was random, again, it goes back to we don’t know the motive, but generally anytime things happen of any kind of nature like this, especially a violent nature, the area is checked quite often and patrols are definitely increased.”
Much as they were after a shootout in the parking lot in may of last year, which left a 78-year-old woman dead who had been selling frozen treats to children on the sidewalk in front of the SaveMart in the same shopping center.
“Maybe they could have security guards. Maybe they could have a uniformed officer patrolling every 15 or 20 minutes. Whatever,” said Littleton. “It just seems they should be well aware, Baltimore County that is, the trouble that this area is.”
If you have any information about the shooting or the suspects, you can call Metro Crime Stoppers at 1-866-7LOCKUP.
