Police in Stung Treng province are searching for three armed men who fled the scene of a shooting at a cassava warehouse on Wednesday evening that left a truck driver seriously injured, officials said on Thursday.
Leang Soklen, 25, a driver for a cassava trader in Sesan district, was shot once in the stomach while drinking with about a dozen colleagues at the warehouse where they work, according to district police chief On Sam Art.
The shooting took place at about 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Mr. Sam Art said, shortly after three men entered the warehouse and asked to meet with the boss.
“The truck driver stood up and responded, ‘Why do you want to find the cassava trader? It is me,’” he said.
While Mr. Soklen’s claim was just a drunken joke, the police chief said, it proved an unfortunate one.
The strangers shot the truck driver once in the stomach with an AK-47, took a platinum necklace and two bracelets from him, then fled, he said, adding that authorities believed the robbery was an afterthought and that the trader had been targeted in a business dispute.
