South Tucson, AZ – A knife-wielding robber stabbed two people inside a Mexican restaurant before customers and employees tackled him and beat him into submission, surveillance video showed (video below).
Convicted felon Jerry Madril was wanted for a probation violation warrant when he stormed into Mi Nidito restaurant with a knife at about 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday and demanded money, KMSB reported.
Surveillance footage showed customers and workers running out the front door of the restaurant as an altercation spilled into view from a room behind the counter.
Madril then squared off with several employees before he grabbed the cash register and flung it off of the counter.
He delivered a quick kick to the register, then bent down towards it.
Suddenly, a man armed with a chair flew into the frame and began beating Madril with the chair legs, the video showed.
Madril rose up but was tangled in the chair for a moment – just long enough for another employee to grab him from behind in a choke-hold.
As the tussle continued, a man armed with a broom jumped into the fray and customers and employees came from all sides to assist.
“People that were here on scene during the incident – employees and customers – actually apprehended him,” South Tucson Police Public Information Officer Bryce Gardner told KOLD. “He put up a pretty good fight.”
Madril was punched repeatedly as the men held him down and waited for officers to arrive.
"We all had him on the floor and I could feel my leg scratching," Manny Olguin, who has worked as a cook at the restaurant for the past four years, told KMSB. "I was like, 'he's cutting me! He's cutting me!'”
The store’s co-owner sustained a slash wound to the left side of his rib cage, KMSB reported.
"He was outnumbered with the knife," Olguin said. "You could see it was a little box cutter. It wasn't a big machete or nothing."
Olguin said he received 16 stitches to close the slash on his leg. The store’s co-owner is also expected to make a full recovery.
“I’m alive,” Olguin told KMSB. “We’re okay. I can walk.”
Madril was treated for minor injuries.
He has been charged with burglary, aggravated assault, and armed robbery, and was being held on $50,000 bond.
Madril had previously served prison time for convictions including attempted assault, attempted arson, attempted robbery and criminal damage, according to the Arizona Department of Corrections.
As an inmate, he received disciplinary infractions for disruption, disobeying orders, and drug possession.
You can watch surveillance footage of the beatdown below:
