Two Schools Briefly Locked Down After Nearby Robbery
THERMAL – Two men walked into the Apple Mart store in Thermal, shocked a clerk with a stun gun, then ordered everyone on the ground before robbing the place.
“One of the suspects was armed with a stun gun and used it on one of the clerks, causing the clerk to fall to the ground and injure herself,” said Herlinda Valenzuela with the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department.
An ambulance rushed the clerk to the hospital. But, she did not get seriously hurt. The men took money and lottery tickets from the store and also robbed a customer. Yoland Jimenez worked at the Apple Mart for more than 20 years. She wasn’t working when this robbery happened, but she was working when the store got robbed years ago.
“Yes, sadly, this happens. The economic crisis is very difficult right now and this is happening all over the place,” Jimenez says.
Sheriff’s deputies say after the men robbed the store, they came out the front door and left on foot, down Church street here and into a nearby mobile home park where they disappeared.
As a precaution, John Kelley Elementary School, La Familia High School and the Coachella Valley Unified School District office went on lock down. They re-opened half an hour later. Deputies didn’t find the robbers, but did find some Lottery “Scratcher” tickets they think the robbers dropped.
