Investigators from the Orlando police force are looking for a robber who assaulted a clerk at a convenience store. He additionally stole two bottles of wine. Apparently the suspect did not really take anything else from the store, and the motivation behind the theft was not completely clear.
The incident occurred on Friday August 16. The suspect walked into a 7-Eleven convenience store late in the evening. The store is located on Vineland Road. It would seem that the suspect initially appeared to be a regular consumer, and therefore went undetected for a period of time.
When leaving the store, the suspect seemed to have a small wine bottle inside of his pocket. The store clerk noticed that there were two bottles of wine missing from the display. He then attempted to confront the suspect about what was apparently an act of shoplifting.
After having been confronted the suspect punched the clerk in the face. He then left the store, according to the report, and got into a brown SUV. A woman drove the motor vehicle. They then left and went north on Bruton Boulevard.
The clerk was then taken to Florida Hospital South. He was treated for a broken nose that he received when the suspect punched him. Police are continuing to investigate the relatively unusual robbery. While individuals looking for money or at least goods that are easily exchangeable into cash usually carry out robberies, this does not appear to be the case in this situation.
Police were unable to recover the missing wine bottles, since they do not have a suspect in custody. They valued the stolen wine at only $8. This is far too low a sum to assume that money was the primary motivation in this particular crime.
One might safely assume that the suspect had wished to consume the wine. Those unwilling to pay for them sometimes steal low value items, and that might be the case in this situation. Until police are able to collect more information they will not be able to establish any real motivation for the theft of the $8 wine bottles.