Robber Killed, Employee Wounded in Jewelry Store Shootout

Las Vegas—A robber was killed and an employee critically wounded Saturday in a shootout at a jewelry store in a shopping center off the Las Vegas Strip.

According to the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, the incident started at 5:07 p.m. at a store in the 900 block of E. Sahara Avenue.

The store, according to the Las Vegas Sun, was John Fish Jewelers, an independent jeweler that has been in business since 1955.

The Sun reported that two armed men entered the store with intention to rob it and tie up employees and shoppers but a longtime John Fish Jewelers employee with a permit to carry a concealed weapon emerged from a back room and began exchanging fire with at least one of the suspects.

The employee was hit and critically wounded. He remained hospitalized as of Wednesday, police said. A customer also was struck by a bullet but is expected to survive.

The robber, identified by the Sun as 33-year-old Sir Isley Duncan, died at the scene.

Police said the second suspect remains at large and is described only as an adult black male who was last seen wearing dark-colored clothing.

The owners of John Fish Jewelers did not respond to a message left at the store Wednesday.

Jewelers’ Security Alliance President John J. Kennedy said Wednesday that the man who died in the shooting in Las Vegas on Saturday was the only individual killed while in commission of a jewelry crime in 2018.

There also was only one jeweler murdered while on the job in 2018, 32-year-old Jason Cullen, who was shot in the abdomen when two men tried to rob his parents’ jewelry and pawn shop in Highland, California in January. The suspects were arrested in February.

Those are both 35-year lows for the jewelry industry, Kennedy said.

Saturday’s shooting marked the second time in two weeks in which a jewelry store owner or employee opened fire on a robber.

On Dec. 13, a jeweler in Sunrise Beach, Florida—who is also a retired New York City policeman—shot at two robbers as they were speeding away in an SUV. JCKOnline.com reported that the incident touched off a debate online in regard to the jeweler’s decision to shoot at fleeing suspects.