A customer foiled a robbery attempt at the Shari’s restaurant on Bend’s north side Tuesday night, and now police are looking for two would-be thieves.
Bend police were called to the restaurant at 3098 N. U.S. Highway 97 just before 8 p.m., where they learned a man had entered the back part of the restaurant and used a prying tool to open a cash register near the video lottery machines. A Shari’s employee interrupted the man as he was attempting to carry off a cash drawer, and the man pushed her to the ground.
The commotion attracted the attention of restaurant patron Christopher Strain, 31, of Bend. Strain witnessed the man assaulting the employee and began fighting with him. The man dropped the cash drawer and his tool and fled to a nearby vehicle driven by a woman. The man and the woman drove away, and have not been located by police.
The male suspect is believed to be in his late 40s, 5 feet 7 inches to 5 feet 11 inches tall, and weighing between 170 and 250 pounds. He has brown or salt-and-pepper-colored hair, and was wearing glasses, a tan coat, light blue jeans and a dirty hat. The female who drove him from the scene,in what is believed to have been a dark blue Jeep Cherokee with tinted windows, is thought to be between 20 and 30 years old, about 5 feet 8 inches tall and 120 pounds.
— From staff reports
