ALLENTOWN, Pa. – Shots were fired in the parking lot of a shopping mall Friday during an apparent holdup of an armored car, officials said.
People ran into the mall for safety after the gunfire began. Bank of America spokesman Ernesto Anguilla said the shooting was apparently related to an attempted holdup of an armored car.
"None of our associates or customers were injured," Anguilla said.
Television footage showed three bullet casings in the parking lot of the South Mall, where police converged shortly after 10:30 a.m.
An employee headed to work noticed a vehicle in the parking lot between the bank and the mall entrance and became suspicious, said Shawn Southard, a spokesman for mall owner Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust.
The employee alerted mall security, who in turned contacted police, Southard said.
Patty Dudley, a shopper from Macungie, said she was at Stein Mart in the mall when employees ushered her and other customers to the back of the store. They told her something had happened outside and customers could not leave.
"I was just making a return and then I was hiding under a clothing rack," she told The Morning Call, an Allentown newspaper.
The shooting occurred just over the Allentown city line in Salisbury Township. Police officials there declined immediate comment.
Get all the stories you need-to-know from the most powerful name in news delivered first thing every morning to your inbox