The Busboys and Poets store in the Mount Vernon Triangle neighborhood of Washington, D.C., was robbed at gunpoint Sunday night, NBC4 Washington reported. No employees were harmed during the robbery and the search is ongoing for the three men responsible.
Per D.C. police, the three suspects entered the restaurant and bookstore around 9:30 p.m. on Sunday, and one approached the manager to ask about a food order. When she went to go check on a possible order, the man brandished a gun, asked where the money was and told the manager to get on the ground. She then "threw the store's keys onto the floor, got on the ground and told the robber the money was in the back."
Employees told police that the two other suspects had long guns and exited through the back of the store, while the man who first approached the manager exited out of the front door. They left with the store keys and were last seen getting into a black Volvo sedan.
"Luckily, everyone was physically safe," Andy Shallal, owner of Busboys and Poets, told NBC4. "Of course, very traumatized during this horrific ordeal."
He added that he feels the robbery was part of a "pandemic of violence" that has been exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic and is affecting D.C. and much of the U.S. "We need to figure out what is going on. You need opportunities. And when opportunities are taken away from them, and when they see the world is really crumbling before them, they see no hope and they revert to stupid things like this."