Texas Store Clerks Fight Back, Chase Off Would-Be Robbers: Video

ARLINGTON, TX — First, police don’t recommend that you do this at all, saying that any time someone with a gun demands your money or property, you should hand it over without protest. Second, in a world where the underdog almost never wins and the human spirit suffers because of it, it is not only permissible but probably also therapeutic to stand up and cheer a video of the industrial-sized can of human whup-ass a father and son laid down on two men who tried to rob their electronics store.

Police circulated the July 18 in-store security video showing the dramatic encounter between the would-be robbers and store owner Khurrum Monga and his son, Haris, in hopes that someone can identify them. The two men got away after the Mongas’ epic takedown, but empty-handed and, likely, humiliated.

Khurrum Monga told reporters the two men looked suspicious from the moment they walked in the door of his store. It was a sweltering, 100-degree day in Arlington, and one of them was wearing a black hoodie. They claimed to have electronics they wanted to sell, but instead of pulling out a cellphone, one of them displayed a gun. (For more local news, click here to sign up for real-time news alerts and newsletters from Dallas Patch, or click here to find your local Texas Patch. Also, if you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

The Mongas weren’t having that for a moment.

After the first man leapt over the counter, the father and son crime-fighting duo went after him and got him in a wrestling hold in the narrow alley behind the counter. The first man came closer with his gun, and the second made a break for it, dragging the Mongas along with him to the door. The first suspect had already fled the store but came back to help his partner wrangle out his hooded sweatshirt, which one of the men had a hold on, and break free.

It was all very harrowing but over in a matter of seconds. Khurrum Monga told WDFW/KDFI that while he and his son were holding one of the suspects, he was yelling at his accomplice to “Shoot them! Shoot them!”

The Arlington Police Department’s Steven Bartolotta said robbery targets need to try to defend themselves, but the Mongas took self-defense to an extreme, dangerous level.

“This is not something we recommend,” Bartolotta said, “because you cannot replace your life.”

Image and video via Associated Press