Video: Gutsy female cashier turns the tables on knife-wielding crook, wrestling weapon from him and chasing him out of store

Surveillance video caught the scary moments when a crook went behind a convenience store counter and held a knife against a female cashier's waist — only to see the tables turned on him when the gutsy cashier wrestled the weapon from his hand and chased him out of the store.

What are the details?

Video shows a customer purchasing items from Amaya’s Mini Market in the Westlake neighborhood of Los Angeles just after 2 p.m. Thursday, KNBC-TV reported.

The station said the customer soon asked the cashier to retrieve something from the back wall behind the register, the station said. Then video shows him pulling out a large knife from a plastic bag he was carrying and moving in close to the cashier and holding the knife against her waist.

Image source: KNBC-TV video screenshot

“He attacked the lady, telling her to open the register, and the lady didn’t want to open it,” Rene Amaya, the store owner, told KNBC.

Amaya added to the station that his employee held the knife handle to keep her attacker from stabbing her.

“It’s unbelievable the guy taking advantage of the woman working by herself here,” Amaya added to KNBC.

Video shows the cashier screaming and then in a flash turning the tables on her attacker, wrestling away the weapon:

Image source: KNBC-TV video screenshot

Image source: KNBC-TV video screenshot

With that, the crook falls back to his only option: Running for his life.

Indeed, the cashier — now in control of the situation — easily chases her attacker out of the store.

Image source: KNBC-TV video screenshot

The station said the attacker got away, and police are still searching for him.

Amaya added to KNBC that the attacker may have overheard another customer making a large money transfer, left the store, and then returned within a few minutes holding the plastic bag containing the knife, hoping to rob the place after the money transfer.

The store owner also told the station he believes the crook may live close by.

“I want them to arrest him because he can’t be outside,” Amaya noted to KNBC.

How is the cashier doing?

Amaya added to the station that his cashier was shaken up but already is back at work, noting that her ability to stay calm and react quickly helped keep her safe.

Image source: KNBC-TV video screenshot

Los Angeles police are investigating the attack, and anyone who may recognize the man in the video is urged to contact police.

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