When an armed robber held up Dexter’s Unisex Barber Shop, Wing Madness came to the rescue — with firepower of its own.
Dexter Jones was closing up his Dixwell Avenue barber shop at 11 p.m. Monday when two masked men came to the door. They demanded money.
Before they got the loot, they were in for a surprise.
Two guys next door, owners of the Wing Madness restaurant, rushed out with guns of their own. Their guns were legal. They opened fire on the robbers.
An extensive shootout ensued between the Wing Madness duo and the two robbers. About 40 shell casings were later found at the scene.
The two groups were still shooting at each other when cops showed up, according to city spokeswoman Jessica Mayorga.
Cops saw two suspects flee the scene, she said. One jumped in Jones’s truck and crashed it into a telephone pole. The suspect then got out and jumped into a car that was heading south on Dixwell. The other suspect fled on foot, she said.
Jones emerged unscathed.
“Everything is OK, except for my truck,” Jones said while snipping an older man’s hair Tuesday morning at the shop at 716 1/2 Dixwell Ave.
Soon after the incident, police found a suspicious vehicle in the parking lot of
Presidential Gardens at 573 Dixwell Ave. They arrested three occupants, ages 16, 24 and 31. One was charged with illegal gun possession. Cops aren’t sure if they were the same people involved in the shootout, Mayorga said.
Tuesday morning at Wing Madness, the two owners were serving up lunch orders with their signature 14 sauces. They declined to take credit for their civilian rescue efforts, or to be identified.
“I fired a few shots, and they got scared off,” one of them said.
A woman who works in the shop next door to Wing Madness came in to thank them.
“I heard you helped my man out!” called the jubilant young woman, slapping hands with the man behind the counter. The woman works next door at Visel’s Pharmacy.
She asked if the Wing men were going to get in trouble for coming to a friend’s defense. One shook his head — no, he didn’t think so.
Then she turned to a cop, James Baker, who was in the chicken shop gathering info on the crime.
“Y’all can’t arrest the Wing Madness,” she urged, “‘cause we need our chicken!”
“Visel’s, Wing Madness, Dexter’s, we look out for each other,” she said. “We a family here.”
I'm a gun owner myself and I am very much in support of the right to defend oneself. But in this case it sounds like the Madness folks created a situation more hazardous than previously existed. Brave and undoubtedly inspired by good intentions, but an exchange of 40 rounds in a residential area doesn't really seem to be worth the potential risk to bystanders.