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Gun Battle Breaks Out During Brooklyn Gas Station Robbery, Owner Wounded

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A gun battle broke in Brooklyn Monday afternoon, when thieves tried to hold up a gas station owned by a retired correction officer who ended up being wounded.

As CBS2's Alice Gainer reported, the robbery happened around 1:30 p.m. at the Sunoco station at Gates and Throop avenues in Bedford-Stuyvesant. The gas station remained cordoned off with crime scene tape three and a half hours later as police continued to investigate.

Evidence markers on the ground showed how many shots were fired between the men, and car windows were also shot out.

Police said two men tried to rob the gas station owned by the 70-year-old former correction officer. The owner has his own registered legal firearm and shot at the suspects, police said.

The suspects fired at the owner and wounded him in the leg, but he was expected to recover, police said.

A witness, Michael Edwards, said he counted 11 gunshots and saw the wounded owner.

"I saw him when they were taking him away on the stretcher in the ambulance…. He was, well, sitting up -- well, not sitting up but raised up and talking," Edwards said.

The suspects took off. Police had not indicated late Monday whether they stole anything.

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