Video shows brazen criminals shooting up Louisville smoke shop

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WAVE) - It was a brazen robbery in the middle of the day that left a business owner shot multiple times.

WAVE 3 News obtained surveillance video of the moment the shooting took place from a witness. The video shows two men entering the store with a witness later described as a semi-automatic rifle. The men are then seen shooting in the street as they leave the store's doors.

It all unfolded at the N&T Smokers Outlet at the corner of Beecher Street and 5th Street around 3 p.m.

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According to a witness, he heard the gunshots and ran inside the store to help.

“It had to be 20 plus gunshots going off,” he said. That witness did not want to be identified.

After hearing the gunshots, the witness said he saw two vehicles speed away; a marked black van and a red pickup truck. Those vehicles can also be seen on the security camera footage.

He told us he found the business owner lying on top of shattered glass and that he’d been shot multiple times.

That witness was a Marine and said his training kicked in as he administered a tourniquet to his leg.

“The best thing I could do was remain calm,” he said. “The only thing Derek (the owner) could do, he was trying to call his mama to let her know he’d been shot. After that, after he got on the phone with her and told her he’d been shot I told him to put his phone down and remain calm, and tell him not to move.”

The witness said the store owner fired back at the suspects.

“Derek is a fighter and was fighting to get up off the ground and I told him to stay calm and relax,” the witness said.

He described the store as being a disaster after the bullets were fired inside the building.

He said the criminals weren't wearing masks and questions just how smart they are.

“There are 20 cameras inside of it,” he said of the store, adding that surrounding neighbors have cameras too. “They will be caught. It is pretty stupid to try to rob a store in broad daylight with no mask, in marked vehicles, fully loaded with cameras because there’s cameras all over this neighborhood.”

LMPD confirms the business owner has non-fatal injuries.

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