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8-Year-Old Gunman Allegedly Tries To Rob Convenience Store [Video]

By Robert Jonathan
Published on: 07:45 PST, Feb 6, 2016

An 8-year-old boy confidently strolled into a Florida grocery store with a loaded 9 mm handgun and tried to hold up the place, according to authorities and various news outlets.

The youngster who barely could see over the counter was wearing a motorcycle helmet, baggy clothes, and had a sweater over his mouth when he allegedly tried to rob the Kings Food and Meat Bazaar in West Palm Beach at gunpoint at about 6 p.m. on Wednesday in the “bizarre” incident captured on surveillance video.

Threatening the worker with a gun, the boy allegedly ordered the worker at the checkout register to “give me the f*****g money,” before he was disarmed by the quick-acting cashier and another employee, NBC West Palm Beach affiliate WPTV reported. The workers had no idea it was a real gun at the time.

“I just took his hand, twisted it, took the gun away from him and took it to the office,” said the employee, who reportedly subdued the boy who was trying to flee and then called 911.

According to WSVN, the boy allegedly stole the weapon from his mother’s purse when he told her he was going out to play in the park. “‘When I grabbed my purse, it was so light. I’m like, I knew I was missing something. I said, Where’s my gun? The first thing I thought was, I hope Jaden don’t have my gun.'”

“Police said there were no bullets in the chamber,” CBS News reported, which contradicts the WSVN account that the weapon was loaded.

Responding cops took the 8-year-old to a local hospital for a mental evaluation after which he was transported to juvenile detention for booking.

Authorities initially charged the child with attempted armed robbery with a firearm and aggravated assault, but prosecutors opted against pressing charges, although a judge imposed certain conditions to avoid further legal jeopardy. “The child must attend a diversion program and has been ordered to stay away from the convenience store. If he doesn’t comply the state could reinstate the charges.”

No charges will apparently be filed against the mom, either.

“It’s so shocking. I feel like you have to be careful with everybody nowadays. You can never be too careful,” the clerk acknowledged in response to the attempted robbery by the armed 8-year-old boy.

In a separate and unrelated strange incident that also occurred in West Palm Beach last September, a homeless woman allegedly drove off in a delivery van containing 100 meals for the homeless this morning, in an incident caught on surveillance video. To make matters worse perhaps, the woman who reportedly absconded with the food truck operated by a charity had just received a free breakfast from the homeless outreach organization that owned the same vehicle. his dine-and-dash incident occurred back in September. Cops later found the van abandoned but undamaged elsewhere in the city later that day, but the female suspect, and all the food that had been inside were long gone.

Elsewhere in Palm Beach County, a man was evidently so protective of his graham crackers and unwilling to share the snacks that he allegedly clocked another man in the head with a bottle of hot sauce, rendering that man unconscious, in an October 2015 encounter.

Taking all the circumstances into consideration, do you agree with the decision by prosecutors to drop the charges against the alleged eight-year-old West Palm Beach armed convenience store robber?

[image via Shutterstock]

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