TOLEDO, Ohio — Five armed robberies have happened at businesses in Toledo since last Friday, four of which happened in the Five Points neighborhood.
The events began last Friday when a Shell gas station in south Toledo was robbed.
On Monday, the Berdan Express Mart and Little Caesars Pizza were robbed. And on Wednesday morning, Speedway and 7-Eleven gas stations were hit.
The four Five Points robberies happened within blocks of each other, and Toledo police said at least two of them are connected in a police report. The robberies at Berdan Express Mart and Little Caesars happened just six minutes apart, and witnesses at each gave matching descriptions of the suspects to police and said they fled both scenes in a black Jeep.
A 16-year-old suspect has been arrested and charged, Toledo police announced Thursday. The second suspect has not been identified.
The police report named Shannon Southard as one of the armed robbery victims.
Southard said she was working as a clerk at Berdan Express Mart at the time of the robbery. She claimed the robbery suspects were wearing ski masks and pointed a gun at her.
She recounted more of her experience to WTOL 11:
"They walked around the counter, the one with the gun jumped over the counter, put it in my face," Southard said. "I said 'what do you want?' He looks me dead in the face and says, 'what do you think I want?' I opened the cash register and gave him every single dollar that was in there. He then looked at me and then said, 'I need you to open that safe.' I told him I couldn't. The gun got closer to my face. He then said that three or four more times, grabbed something off of the counter and ran out of the store."
Southard has been a cashier at the Berdan Express Mart for over four years. While she wasn't physically harmed in the robbery, the incident left mental scars that she said will last long after the robbers spend what little money they got away with.
The gun pointed at her in particular replays over and over in her head, she said. She was worried she might not return home alive to her children that day.
Eventually, the robbers left the store and Southard returned home to her kids.
"All I could do was hug my kids. That's all I could do," she said. "I cried myself to sleep and I had to be up and at work at 8 a.m. I was still up at 5 or 6 a.m. because I couldn't sleep."
When she returned to work, she said that all she could see was the barrel of the gun in her face. She had "quite a few panic attacks and ended up freaking out and walking out on my shift," she said.
Unable to work, Southard said her boss fired her. She thinks he'll eventually let her return as the Berdan Express Mart is a second home to her, but she said she needs to get herself in order first.
Southard isn't the only one in the Five Points neighborhood with that harrowing experience. Toledo police said guns were drawn during the Little Caesars robbery too.
This string of robberies has caught the attention of Toledo City Council member Theresa Morris, who lives in the Five Points neighborhood. She said she will discuss the issue with the Toledo Police Department on Thursday.
On Thursday, police announced the arrest of the 16-year-old suspect, charged with the robberies of all five businesses in south and west Toledo. WTOL 11 does not name minors charged with crimes unless they are tried as adults.
Police are seeking information on the second suspect with a $5,000 cash reward for information and ask anyone who may know who the second suspect is to call or text Crime Stoppers at 419-255-1111. You can remain anonymous.
