Clerk Who Offered to Work Shift Is Slain : Crime: Two bandits take less than $100 in La Habra. New worker was trying to make a good impression with boss, family said.

Even though it meant working on the morning of his 44th birthday, Nirmal Singh volunteered to fill in during the overnight shift Monday at the 7-Eleven store, where he had been hired just two weeks before. He hoped to make a good impression, family members said.

Halfway through Singh’s shift at the Imperial Highway store about 3 a.m., two robbers entered. As one made small talk with Singh, the other pulled a handgun and fatally shot the Fullerton husband and father of three in the chest, police said.

A videotape shows the gunman’s partner then jumping the counter and grabbing less than $100 from the cash register before the pair fled, Police Capt. John Rees said.

“It was totally unprovoked,” Rees said of the shooting.

A customer discovered Singh’s body minutes later. The clerk was pronounced dead at the scene, Rees said.

La Habra police were searching for the two suspects shown on the videotape, which “depicts the crime clearly,” Rees said. “We also have some forensic evidence, including fingerprints.”

The two men appear to be in their early 20s. One was dressed in light clothing and the other in dark clothes, Rees said.

“It’s not a family portrait,” Rees said of the videotape. “There’s not much clarity, but we’re hoping somebody will be able to look at this and recognize them.”

Singh, from India’s northern Punjab region, came to Orange County 2 1/2 years ago in search of a better life for his family, including children now 12, 7 and 5.

“We’re devastated,” said Bhajan Bhinder, Singh’s brother-in-law. “It’s a senseless, senseless murder.”

When Singh was hired at the 7-Eleven earlier this month, his wife cautioned him against working the night shift.

“She thought it was too dangerous,” Bhinder said.

The 7-Eleven store, at 541 W. Imperial Highway, is usually quiet, authorities said. The late-night traffic consists mostly of truck drivers on their way to make early-morning deliveries to food stores and shopping centers along Imperial Highway.

“The store is not in a high-crime area,” said Kevin Eliason, a security manager for Southland Corp., the franchise company for 7-Eleven stores. “It’s well-lit and on a busy street. This is definitely an aberration.”

In October, 1992, a 22-year-old store clerk was shot in the chest at a Santa Ana 7-Eleven after he handed a robber $65 from the register. Varinder Singh, also from India’s Punjab region, died three days later.

Last April, a Tustin 7-Eleven clerk survived being shot in the neck at close range by gang members just hours after the clerk had caught two juvenile gang members stealing beer and restrained one of them until police arrived.

“In my career here, I can’t remember anything this vicious in terms of a robbery,” the police’s Rees said, adding that based on the videotape, Singh did “absolutely nothing” to provoke the shooting. “This type of crime is foreign to La Habra because we’re not near a freeway corridor. When you’re near a freeway, this type of crime is more common.”

The owners of the 7-Eleven would not comment on the crime. The doors were shut Monday morning, and cardboard signs hung in the window saying the store was closed for repairs. By noon, however, it was open for business.

Police are asking anyone with information to call La Habra Police Detective Kirk Lotzgesell or the watch commander on duty at (310) 905-9777.