PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad – A St Augustine businesswoman turned the tables on two armed robbers after she drew her licensed pump action shotgun and opened fire on the suspects at her mini-mart last Friday.The suspects, police said, got more than what they bargained for when 35-year-old Shanlot Shande, the proprietor of A&S Food Plus Mini Mart, pulled out the shotgun and defended herself. One of the suspects, 35, of Mount Lambert, Champs Fleurs, was shot and wounded when Shande fired two shots at him and his accomplice during the incident. Another man was waitingin a getaway car.Officers said the suspects apparently became disoriented when Shande drew the shotgun.The injured man is in stable condition under police guard at the Eric Williams Medical Sciences Complex, Mount Hope, with gunshot wounds to the upper part of his body.Police said the three men entered the business place, pretending to be customers. One of the men pulled out a gun and threatened to shoot Shande as she held her two-year-old child. She asked the robbers for permission to place the child in a crib and as she made her way to a back room, the suspects opened the cash register and stole TT$2 000.To the surprise of the suspects, Shande returned with a pump action shotgun and opened fire on the men. The men ducked for cover and, without returning shots, made a hasty retreat into a black Lancer motorcar.“We believe that their main focus was to escape from the woman before she killed one of them,” a source close to the investigation told the Sunday Express. (Trinidad Express/JS)
