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A family is shaken after armed thieves stormed into their taco truck and attacked an employee in Long Beach.
Surveillance video captured the masked thieves entering the Los Bros Tacos truck on Dec. 16 when Manuel Antonio was working in the kitchen.
“I was chopping the produce when they got in the truck and I didn’t see them coming, only when they pulled out the gun,” Antonio recalled through a Spanish translator.
Two men are seen walking in and surrounding Antonio while pointing a gun towards him.
As Antonio turns around to gesture to the truck owner for cash from the register, a second thief quickly takes Antonio’s phone from his back pocket.
Suddenly, the man sucker-punches Antonio as he collapses to the ground. The suspects escaped with an unknown amount of cash from the register.
“Yes, I was scared,” Antonio said. “I was scared when they got in the truck. I was so scared because of the gun they had. I’ve been scared since that day.”
The Los Bros Taco truck is located on Junipero Avenue and 7th Street in Long Beach. The family-owned truck has been in business for about five years, however, they only started serving the Long Beach location two months ago.
The truck’s owner, Augustine Flores, said the area appeared to be safe but is now uncertain after the terrifying incident.
His wife and 9-year-old son were inside the truck and witnessed the armed robbery. His other son, Yostin Flores, was standing just outside.
“We didn’t want to make them pull the trigger or something,” Yostin recalled. “A bad bullet could’ve hit my brother or the coworker or my dad.”
Still shaken from the ordeal, Augustine said he had no choice but to push through and continue working. He’s thankful nobody was seriously injured or killed.
“We need to keep working because this time of the year is the most busy, with Christmas and we have to pay the rent,” Augustine said. “We need to keep working because we need to make ends meet. We need to pay gas, rent and insurance. To do this, we need a lot of money. No one is going to help us, so we have to keep going.”
A GoFundMe campaign to help recover the stolen cash, Antonio’s cell phone and offset medical bills can be found here.
Police are investigating the surveillance video as the gunmen remain at large.
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