Horrified onlookers have watched on as two gunmen stole cash from a sports bar before they fired shots and assaulted a man in a shopping centre carpark in Melbourne’s southeast.
The hunt is on to find the two armed men who entered the Vegas Waverley Gardens sports bar on Police Road in Mulgrave shortly before 6.30pm on Friday night and demanded cash.
Victoria Police said the men obtained an unknown amount of cash before being chased out by patrons into the nearby Waverley Gardens Shopping Centre car park
There was a high presence of police at Waverley Gardens Shopping Centre on Friday night following an armed robbery of a sports bar
It is the second time within three weeks that the suburban shopping centre has been targeted by armed gunmen
According to 9 News, there was an altercation in the car park between bar patrons and the gunmen, where a shot is believed to have been fired into the roof.
A man aged in his 50s has been assaulted with a rifle during the incident before being taken to Dandenong Hospital with minor upper body injuries.
‘The exact circumstances surrounding the incident are still being determined and no arrests have been made at this time,’ a police statement said.
One witness said one of the men had pointed a gun at him and that his friend was hit in the head by the butt of a rifle.
‘A guy I was having a drink with tackled this guy at the end of the stairwell and then I saw another one at the cash register who pointed a gun,’ the witness told AAP.
‘He ran past and smashed my friend in the head with the rifle butt.’
Dandenong North resident Ben, who didn’t reveal his surname, said he saw two men wearing hoodies walking out of the shopping centre with rifles.
‘They were running and then about half a dozen members of the public came running out, they were shouting things like ‘how dare you’ while they chased after them,’ he told 9news.com.au.
‘And then I hear a loud bang, I’ve never heard a gunshot in my life, I have no doubt it wasn’t just a car backfiring. I didn’t look back I didn’t see anything that happened after that.’
Victoria Police are yet to make any arrests in relation to Friday night’s incident
A woman and her four-year-old grandson almost walked straight into the incident.
‘I’m not sure how I feel … just lucky I suppose we didn’t get caught up in it all,’ she told the Age.
‘Though also a little angry that we could have. It is a little scary to think how easily it could be to just innocently walk into such a situation like that.’
It is the second time within three weeks the suburban shopping centre has been targeted by armed thieves.
A gun-wielding motorcyclist held up two security guards outside the shopping centre before he fled with bags of cash on February 14.