Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : Man Wounded in Pizza Shop Robbery

A 60-year-old cocktail bar customer was wounded by gunfire when he stepped outside just after the robbery of a nearby pizza shop in Lancaster, sheriff’s deputies said Thursday.

The shooting victim, identified as L. C. Cox, a resident of a rural community near Lancaster, was in fair condition Thursday following surgery at Antelope Valley Hospital, Sheriff’s Sgt. Bob Denham said.

The incident began Wednesday evening when two men, wearing ski masks and carrying handguns, entered Shakey’s Pizza at 1324 W. Ave. I and ordered two employees and four customers to lie on the floor. The men stole about $300 from the cash register, then left without harming anyone inside the restaurant, Denham said.

Just before the holdup, however, a fifth customer had walked outside to get cigarettes from her car. According to police reports, she saw the gunmen enter the pizza shop, then ran into a nearby bar, Maxdons Cocktails, and told the people inside that a robbery was under way at Shakey’s.

“Two (bar) customers exited the front door and saw the suspects running from Shakey’s,” Denham said. “The suspects then began firing their handguns.”

Cox, one of the curious bar customers, was hit in the shoulder and fell against the wall of the bar, the sergeant said.

After the gunmen fled in a gray 1979 or 1980 Pontiac Firebird, several people at the pizza shop and the bar called 911. Paramedics treated Cox at the scene and rushed him to the hospital, where he underwent surgery for the wound.

The gunmen remain at large, Denham said.