Tales from the Morgue: These dumb robbers also waited on customers

Gunman's Mistake Ends In Arrest At Nogales

Two gunmen who waited on customers while robbing a southside grocery Tuesday evening were located by sheriff's investigators yesterday morning — in the Nogales jail on federal charges.

Sheriff's investigators Lon Chapman and Joseph Muggly, who traced the pair's identity through California authorities, said the men made one grave mistake:

In the haste of escaping, one bandit tossed his own wallet out the getaway car's window — believing that he was discarding the rifled billfold of one of his victims. The wallet contained California parole papers.

The pair, both of San Fernando, Calif., calmly confessed stealing two cars and holding up the Food Spot at 5256 Nogales highway, after locking the two owners and their wives in a frozen food vault.

The men were picked up at the border Friday by Nogales police when they tried to sell stolen revolvers and couldn't account for the car they were driving.

They told officers they arrived in Tucson Tuesday afternoon and stopped at the Food Spot for some lunch meat. They cased the place and returned at 7:30 p.m. to hold it up.

"Sure, we put four people in the deep freeze and sold some whisky to a couple customers when they blundered in on our little heist . Why not?" the investigators quoted one man.

Both claimed they got $207 from the till. The owners reported $500 taken.

Before leaving, the gunmen snatched a wallet containing about $15 from Harry Hong.

Speeding away, one man inadvertently tossed his own billfold —loaded with personal identification — out the car window south of the store. Later, Hong and and southside fireman Richard Vitinghoff found the gunman's wallet and turned it in to the sheriff's office.

The robbers fled and hid out in the Nogales, Sonora, red light district, they said. Getting low on funds Friday, they tried to sell some revolvers they took in a Gallup, N.M., burglary. The two had $47 between them at the time of arrest, plus three guns and the Texas car with "new" license plates, stolen and attached the preceding day.