Robber Posing as Store Employee Can’t Pull It Off

A thief posed as a clothing store employee and tried to sell a shirt when two customers walked in as he was apparently looting the cash register.

With the store manager tied up in a back room, the robber had the customers fooled until he became flustered when it was time to take payment.

Elizabeth Zita and Merquiedes Kiddy went to the North County Fair mall Thursday morning to buy some last-minute things the day before their wedding.

The Escondido couple went into a men’s clothing store, The Oak Tree, to buy a white dress shirt for Kiddy to wear during their civil ceremony and encountered a man whom they later learned was robbing the store.

“He didn’t look like a robber; he just looked like he worked there. I thought he was in charge of the store,” said Zita, 35.

“We wanted to buy a shirt and I asked the man at the cash register if he had it in a medium size. He said: ‘I’ve got to go look in the back.’ He went back and got the medium size.”

But when she told the man they wanted to buy the shirt, Zita said, he began acting peculiar and looked nervous.

“He said: ‘I’ll be right back,’ and then he grabbed a hat and put it on his head and ran out of the store,” Zita said. “He just took off and ran.”

Kiddy and Zita left the store quite puzzled.

After they left, store manager Shawn Cook, who was tied up in a bathroom, freed herself and called police. The bandit had zapped her with an electric stun gun and a female accomplice had tied her hands after she opened the store alone about 10 a.m.

The robber took $180 and a ring from the clerk valued at $350, police said.