Jewelry store clerk, bystander shot during robbery, Thomasville ... - Winston-Salem Journal
A clerk at a Thomasville jewelry store was shot in the neck Tuesday afternoon and a bystander who followed three armed-robbery suspects also was shot, authorities said.
The robbery happened at Avis’ Fine Jewelry, located at 709 Randolph St., Thomasville police said. Robert Wayne Heath Jr., 21, David Edward Perry III, 19, and Donald Donell Chambers Jr., 21, all of Statesville each were charged with attempted murder, robbery with a dangerous weapon, and kidnapping, police said.
Kerry Chambers, 59, a witness, followed the suspects’ vehicle, a moped, and gave police the suspects’ descriptions, police said.
At some point, a confrontation ensued between the witness and the three suspects.
Chambers followed the suspects in his truck, police said. Chambers then observed the moped’s back passenger retrieve a handgun and point it at him.
Chambers hit the moped, knocking both suspects off. One suspect ran away while the other picked up the gun and shot Chambers in the neck before running from the scene, police said.
Chambers was taken to Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, where he was in stable condition, police said.
Officers spotted the suspects’ vehicle on Holly Hill Road at a flea market, which is where a vehicle chase with police began, authorities said. On Georgia Avenue, one suspect jumped out of the moving vehicle and ran away.
Police initially looked for that person and considered him “armed and dangerous.”
The vehicle chase continued and the suspects’ vehicle eventually crashed on Eighth Avenue and South State Street in downtown Lexington, police said. Officers then caught the second suspect. High Point police later found the third suspect in the 2100 block of Surrett Drive.
The conditions of the store clerk and witness following the suspect were unknown. Police recovered the jewelry that was stolen from the store.
The jewelry store had been robbed in June 2012, according to FOX8/WGHP, the Winston-Salem Journal’s newsgathering partner. The prior owner was so shaken up that she sold the business, the television station reported.
