Patron Shot and Killed in Anaheim Bar Holdup

A truck driver from Chino Hills was shot in the head and killed early Saturday in a bar during a robbery that turned violent, police and bar patrons said.

Patrons and the owner of the Sherwood Inn said the man was a regular customer whom they knew only as Wayne, a divorced father in his early 40s. When he was shot, they said, he was cooperating fully with the robbers, who had ordered patrons to lie on the floor.

“The bartender said he was quiet. He was lying down,” said Bernard Tran, 52, who has owned the bar at 413 S. Brookhurst St. with his wife for the past four years. “This guy was a nice guy. He never talked back.”

Tran said the 1:20 a.m. shooting and robbery marked the first violence since he bought the establishment, which features pool, darts, shuffleboard and Keno, a video lottery game that filled the cash drawer in the small back office.

Tran’s wife, too distraught to come to work Saturday, was in the rest room when four armed men wearing ski masks entered the bar, Tran said. When she emerged, one grabbed her by the neck and told her to get on the floor with the patrons.

“They robbed everything, the cash drawer, my office,” said Tran, who arrived less than half an hour after the shooting. “My wife is so scared. She said she doesn’t want to come in here no more.”

The Anaheim Fire Department, along with police, responded to the incident and pronounced the victim dead at the scene, police said.

Police said some patrons also were robbed. They did not release the name of the shooting victim.

“It’s a big loss,” said Tran, whose wife felt so secure in the alarm-equipped bar that she had not locked the office door or the drawer where the entire day’s proceeds and the week’s cache of Keno money were stored. The robbers, he said, took almost $5,000.

In their haste, the robbers left one gun on the table in the office after cleaning out the money drawer, Tran said.

A patron said one man in a long leather coat entered the bar first and “cased it” before he and the others returned, all wearing ski masks. Another said the men, who arrived in a red car, argued outside before entering.

On Saturday night, with Patsy Cline’s voice crooning from the jukebox, patrons gathered to discuss the shooting in hushed tones. They speculated that the victim might have recognized one of the robbers.

“Why did they shoot him?” a friend of the owner asked. “People say he was a good guy.”

Tran said the victim had recently purchased a giant silver pickup truck for about $30,000 and that he had showed it off to bar patrons.

“He was real nice, a big rugged guy,” said Brian McQuarrie, a regular at the bar. “He always just talked about his trucks. Every now and then, he talked about his kids.”