Bullets fly in holdup of Beacon Hill store

Friday, November 21, 2003

Bullets fly in holdup of Beacon Hill store
Grocer grazed, but he wounds robber; customer shot, too

By GREGORY ROBERTS
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Between errands yesterday, Christine Gonzalez decided to swing by the Latin American grocery that her husband, Tony, has run on Beacon Hill for 11 years, just stopping by to chat on an ordinary Thursday afternoon.

But this time was different.

"I walked in to see a man holding a gun on my husband and asking him for all the money in the till," she said last night.

And then it got worse.

"All of a sudden, there were guns being fired and all hell broke loose," she said, "and I'm terrified, and I'm thinking he's going to shoot Tony."

He did shoot Tony, the bullet grazing Gonzalez's left hand between his ring finger and little finger.

But Tony shot back. The robber, wounded, fell by the door, then staggered down the sidewalk before collapsing, scattering money in the street, Christine Gonzalez said. He was taken to Harborview Medical Center and likely will survive, police said.

A customer in the store also was hit by a bullet, in the cheek, Christine Gonzalez said.

Neither the holdup man nor the injured customer was identified by police. The robber, who police said dropped his handgun at the store, has not been charged. A 23-year-old Burien man was arrested in an alley behind the store as a suspected accomplice, police said.

Gonzalez's store, La Bodeguita, stocks specialty items from throughout the Spanish-speaking world. It sits at 2528A Beacon Ave. S. among a commercial cluster that includes a Mexican restaurant, a Filipino video store and a Vietnamese takeout joint.

Gonzalez named it for La Bodeguita del Medio, "the little store in the middle," a grocery in Havana in his native Cuba. A graduate of the Cuban naval academy, Gonzalez defected from the Castro regime in 1980, when he jumped ship in Japan. He met Christine, who grew up in Oregon, in Tokyo, where she was teaching English. The couple moved to Seattle in 1985.

After a rash of holdups at mom-and-pop stores was reported in the newspapers a few years ago, Tony Gonzalez bought a gun for protection at work, his wife said. But, although other businesses in the neighborhood have been held up, he never had to pull his weapon -- until 2:15 p.m. yesterday.

The robber, Christine Gonzalez said, spoke Spanish. About 25 years old, , he was unknown to the Gonzalezes. He got the cash -- she didn't know how much -- before the shooting started. There were maybe five shots in all: two by the stranger, three by her husband, Christine Gonzalez said.

"These things happen in a split second," she said.

Tony Gonzalez, 57, didn't want to talk about the holdup. His wife said he told her the robber fired first. And it apparently was the robber's bullet that bloodied the customer, Christine Gonzalez said.

It's uncertain when, or if, La Bodeguita will reopen.

"I don't know if it's really worth it," she said.

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