Auburn Police say they’ve identified teens who robbed gas station

Suspects stole items, cash while clerk lay unconscious on the floor with life-threatening medical emergency

By Robert Whale • September 12, 2018 2:30 pm

A Shell gas station attendant who collapsed at work on the evening of Sept. 8 with a major medical issue while a man and two teens who were in the store at the time did nothing to help remains in critical condition at a local hospital.

But Auburn Police say with video of the incident and the public’s help, they have since talked to the man and identified the two boys, who allegedly took advantage of the situation to steal merchandise from the station and clean out the store’s cash register.

“We have located and spoken with the adult male in the video of the Shell gas station theft, where the clerk had a medical emergency,” Auburn Police Cmdr. Steve Stocker wrote in a press release. “He is fully cooperating with us, and we are confident that he was not actually associated with the two teenagers in the video and does not know them.”

Here is a police synopsis of what happened.

At 5:41 p.m. on Sept. 8, a man and two teenage boys entered the station at 201 Auburn Way S., whereupon one of the teenagers grabbed what appeared to be a pepperoni stick from the counter and started to eat it. He then picked up a second stick and handed it to the other teen.

When the man approached the counter to buy an item, according to police, the clerk tried to charge the man for the pepperoni sticks, and the two began to argue. One of the teens then hands a dollar bill to the clerk. This upset the clerk, who approached the teens and started to talk with them.

Having spoken with the teens, the clerk, dollar bill still in hand, turned back to the register area but collapsed unconscious, according to police. While the man was leaving the store, one of the teenagers reached down and took the dollar bill from the hand of the unconscious clerk. As the stricken clerk lay unconscious on the ground, the boys exited and entered the store a couple of times, stealing merchandise and helping themselves to all the money in the cash register.

According to police, about three minutes later someone else entered the store, saw the clerk on the ground and called 911.