Po­lice are search­ing for two gun­men who shot a Chi­nese busi­ness­man and stole $230,000 dur­ing a rob­bery in the carpark of C3 Shop­ping Cen­tre in San Fer­nan­do on Fri­day night.

Shi Yyan, 46, of Pouchet Street, San Fer­nan­do, was leav­ing his busi­ness, Soft Steps, at 7.45 pm, when two thieves con­front­ed him as he ap­proached his white pan­el van parked in the east­ern car park.

The as­sailants, de­scribed as be­ing about six feet tall with dark com­plex­ions, blocked his path. One of them point­ed a firearm at Yyan and de­mand­ed mon­ey. Fear­ing for his life, he hand­ed over the keys to his van and $230,000 in cash, which he had col­lect­ed from the day’s sales and rent from ten­ants.

De­spite his com­pli­ance, one of the gun­men fired a sin­gle shot, hit­ting Yyan in the left side of his chest. The sus­pects then jumped in­to his van and sped off.

W/Cpl Pitt and PC Rivers, of the St Madeleine Po­lice Sta­tion, re­spond­ed and trans­port­ed Yyan to the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal, where he re­mains in sta­ble con­di­tion. WPC Ny­sus and PC Mad­hoo re­cov­ered a sin­gle 9mm shell from the scene.

Po­lice lat­er found the stolen van aban­doned on Charles Street, Gas­par­il­lo. In­ves­ti­ga­tors are al­so re­view­ing CCTV footage from the shop­ping cen­tre.

In­spec­tor Mo­hammed and PC Ram­jat­tan are con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions. - RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA