No Hold-Up Without A Purchase, Robber Told

An armed robber had to pay for a pack of gum twice Tuesday night while he was trying to rob a department store.

Coeur d’Alene police still are looking for the robber, who made off with an unspecified amount of cash from the Target store on Canfield Avenue.

The man walked up to a cash register inside the store about 8:15 p.m. Tuesday, and handed the cashier a pack of Wrigley’s Doublemint Gum. She scanned the pack and charged him 88 cents, according to a Coeur d’Alene police report.

The robber paid for the pack of gum with a dollar bill but waited too long to demand the money from the cash register. By the time he had pulled up his shirt to display a handgun, the cashier already had closed the register.

When the robber ordered the woman to give him money, she said she could not open the register without a product to scan.

The robber gave her back his pack of gum. The woman scanned the gum and the robber handed her another dollar to pay for it.

The cashier then gave the robber the money from the till. He thanked the cashier and left.

The robber is described as a 22-year-old white man, about 6 feet tall with a slim build, short dark hair and brown eyes. He had a protruding jaw and buck teeth and was wearing a black baseball hat with the rim folded, a black leather coat, a dark T-shirt and dark blue jeans.

, DataTimes