Two gunmen sought in store robbery
By JOHN A. WINTERS
john@newnan.com
Two gunmen robbed a convenience store just north of the Newnan Country Club late Monday.
The owner of Coweta Country Junction, Noor Ali, was taken to Piedmont Newnan Hospital for stitches after being pistol-whipped by one of the gunman, according to Major Jimmy Yarbrough with the Coweta County Sheriff's Office. A second clerk was not injured.
The robbers entered the store about 11 p.m. and one is shown in a security video pointing a gun at Ali. A few moments later, the gunman went behind the counter and struck Ali more than once with the gun, the major said. That gunman was seen wearing a black motorcycle jacket with green stripes on the sleeves, a dark bandana and a colored baseball-type hat. No description was available for the other suspect.
Yarbrough said the gunman picked up a piece of wood and threw it at the other clerk. There were no other people in the store at the time.
The gunmen tried to fill a bag with cigarettes and other items around the counter, and took an undisclosed amount of cash, the major said.
Noor Ali, who originally is from India and became a U.S. citizen in 1994, originally bought the store in 1995. In what he called "the biggest mistake of my life" in a 2008 article in The Newnan-Times Herald, he sold it in 2000. He moved to Dallas, but returned to Newnan in 2005. In 2007, he re-bought Coweta Junction.
