A trio of unlikely heroes didn’t hesitate to leap into action Friday afternoon when they heard a Halifax small business owner yelling down the street after an alleged robber tried to raid her cash till at knife-point.
“I screamed out the front door saying, ‘No way, you’re not getting our money, he’s got a knife,'” Penny MacAuley said, the owner of Penelope’s Boutique. “I stopped in the middle of the street and the guys on the roof of the armories said, ‘Where, where, where?'”
MacAuley says the men who were roofing the armories across the street launched into action.
“They came down those ropes like heroes and chased him up Agricola Street,” she said.
Prys Casler is one of the roofers in the family-run and owned company.
“We were up on the roof and some girl came out of the store behind me and she’s going, ‘This guy has a knife,'” Casler said.
While MacAuley says her shop has been broken into before, this is the first time anybody has attempted to rob her with a weapon.
“I was angry. You know, we’re a small business. Courtney and I work very hard to make our money, and it’s not a lot. We don’t have a lot in the till, but for somebody to just come in and say, give me your money? Excuse me, it’s not their money,” she said.
As for the roofers who didn’t hesitate to spring into action, they may have broken a descent speed record.
“It was pretty quick. We didn’t catch him, but I think I probably got off (the roof) in about 20 seconds,” Casler said.