A man who attempted to flee the scene of a shooting in Svay Rieng province on Saturday night by hailing a motorbike driver who turned out to be an off-duty military police officer was charged with aggravated burglary on Monday, officials said.
Three suspected accomplices who were arrested at a house in Bavet City on Sunday afternoon were released without charge, according to provincial court Judge Tith Sothy Borachhard.
At about 6 p.m. on Saturday, four men in a black Toyota Camry pulled up to the Chhuor Somaly Pharmacy in Svay Rieng City, police said. When one of the men pulled a gun on the owner, Chhuor Somaly, the pharmacist tried to push the weapon away and began yelling, leading the gunman to fire a shot that grazed his arm and another that struck his 5-year-old son in the foot.
Judge Sothy Borachhard said Sam Siny, 31, was charged on Monday after confessing to attempting to rob the pharmacy.
“I finished questioning the suspect late this evening and we charged him with aggravated robbery,” he said, adding that the suspect had been placed in prison to await trial.
After the botched robbery, two of the men fled on foot, one drove away in the car and Mr. Siny jumped on the back of a motorbike whose driver, a military police officer, took him straight to the district military police station, police said.
Mr. Siny then led police to a house in Bavet City where he said his accomplices were hiding. However, Nuth Non, chief of the provincial military police’s penal bureau, said the three men who were arrested in the house had been released after questioning.
“We released the three suspects to go back home because we found out those three were not involved with the pharmacy robbery,” he said. “The suspect also confirmed those three were not involved in the crime.”
Mr. Non said that police now know the identity of the other three suspects, but declined to name them and said they may have fled to Vietnam.
