Pompano Beach jeweler shoots robber to death in failed heist
By Jaime Hernandez, Jamie Malernee and Shannon O’Boye Staff Writers
Posted July 31 2003

POMPANO BEACH — The son of a jewelry store owner shot and killed a
robber Wednesday after four men forced their way into the family store,
shot at the son and pointed a gun to his father’s head.

Broward Sheriff’s Office officials say two robbers were armed, and those
who survived escaped empty-handed. None of the victims inside — the
son, his wife, father, and one employee of Jewelry Francy’s and Fancy’s
Fashion — were hurt.

The incident was just the most recent robbery in a string of several
high-profile jewelry heists to strike South Florida.

Those inside the store were shaken by the experience long after law
enforcement officers arrived with deputies, dogs and a helicopter to
track the suspects, who remained at large.

“We’re going to move from here,” said a second son, Alfredo Guido, who
was not in the store during the robbery. “This already happened to us
once before. We’re not waiting for it to happen again.” He said the
family once owned a store in Mexico that was robbed.

Family members told police the four men were seen casing the store last
week.

“They were here a couple of days ago, said Maggie Guido, the owner’s
daughter. “I guess they scoped out the place before they attempted to
rob it.”

Those who were in the store declined to comment, but Tomas Mata, a
friend and neighboring business owner in the Cypress Village West
Shopping Center on Southwest Sixth Street, sat with them as they told
homicide detectives what happened.

The father and owner of the store, Alfredo “Rafael” Guido, was buzzing
in a client Wednesday morning when one of four masked men stuck his foot
in the door, Mata said.

Alfredo “Rafael” Guido’s daughter-in-law, Francisca, screamed as the men
forced their way into the store and his son, Meliton, grabbed a 9 mm
handgun from under the counter and hid behind the cash register.

Then one of the four men pointed a gun at the father’s head, Mata said.

The other armed man saw the son hiding with a gun. That man fired at the
son, who fired back. The robber missed, and the son’s bullet hit a
different masked man who was not armed, Mata said.

The son yelled to his father, “Quick, jump behind the counter because
they’re going to kill you!” He did, and the men then tried to run from
the store — but couldn’t because the store door had closed and only way
to leave was to be buzzed out. The son hit the buzzer, allowing the four
men to flee.

The man who was shot collapsed, bleeding, in front of the store while
the others escaped.

Eyewitness accounts

Maricela Deboissiere, who works in an accounting office next to the
jewelry store, had seen two men in a green car looking at the store
earlier in the day. From her office, she heard a “pop” and sounds of a
struggle.

“Another guy walked outside and said, `There?s a body over here! Call
911!?” Deboissiere said.
It was the passenger of the suspicious green car she had earlier seen
cruising the parking lot.

Business owner Michael Anderson also ran outside. He says he saw one man
run away from the store and another speed off in a car. He did not see a
third man.

Paramedics arrived and rushed the injured man to North Broward Medical
Center, where he died. The sheriff’s office said they would not release
his name until notifying his next of kin.

Officials later found a green car, a Pontiac Grand Prix, abandoned in a
nearby residential neighborhood at the 200 block of Northwest 14th
Street and impounded it as possible evidence. The car’s owner, a Margate
resident, said it was stolen earlier in the morning from a local repair
shop.

Comparing thefts

In addition to tracking down the suspects, Broward Sheriff’s spokeswoman
Veda Coleman-Wright said detectives will be comparing the details of
Wednesday’s robbery with a recent string of jewelry thefts in South
Florida. She said officials do not think the case is related to the June
28 heist at East Coast Jewelers in Deerfield Beach, in which masked men
stole $1 million in watches and jewelry.

Other recent thefts and robberies at jewelry stores include: $420,000 in
jewelry and cash taken from the Jewelry Exchange and David Morgan Fine
Arts west of Delray Beach on July 6 after thieves ripped holes in the
store ceiling and walls; thousands of dollars in merchandise stolen from
the Jewelry Exchange in Hollywood in late June; another break-in at
South Miami Jewelers by two armed robbers on June 19, and a man who held
up a Mayors Jewelry store at the Dadeland Mall on June 24.

Nor was Wednesday the first to turn deadly. In May, armed robbers killed
two owners of a jewelry store booth at the Opa-locka/Hialeah Flea
Market. In January, a Mayors jewelry store security guard at Merrick
Park mall in Coral Gables was murdered during a robbery.

Wednesday’s shooting underscored a growing fear in Henry Siddique, who
works at a drive-thru convenience store a couple hundred yards from the
jewelry store, which also sells clothes and offers tailoring services.
He does not carry a gun, though he has been robbed two times at
different stores in the past eight years.

“I’m looking for another kind of job now,” he said. “I always felt OK,
but in the past few months I’m very scared.”

Robert Waters, an Ocala resident and author of two books about victims
who fight back, says thousands of people are opting each year to meet
violence with violence.

“A lot of business owners, especially those in a low-income area, know
they will be robbed and at some point make a decision to protect
themselves. They’ve planned this out in their mind and know what they
would do,” Waters said. “I can’t say which is right or wrong, but I
would not want to depend on an armed robber for mercy.”

Whether the recent robberies signify a significant spike in the crime
rate or just a momentary blip remains unclear. Despite the seeming
increase, statistics show that robberies in Broward County, in general,
have plummeted since the 1994, when there were 4,458 reported according
to the National Archive of Criminal Justice. Last year, there were less
than 3,000 reported, according to the Florida Department of Law
Enforcement.