By CLIFFORD FAIPARIK
TWO thugs were shot dead by security guards after they tried to hold up an armoured vehicle near the YWCA hostel in Port Moresby yesterday morning.
An expatriate who was accompanying the vehicle was shot in the shoulder in the shootout which lasted about 10 minutes.
A third man tried to escape by mingling with the bystanders but they handed him over to the police.
The would be robbers were believed to have used four cars in the attempted heist and had followed the armoured car from Seven Mile at about 10.45am.
The Protect Security guards in the armoured vehicle became suspicious when they noticed a car speeding towards them at Murray Barracks.
“They warned our escort vehicles to be ready for a possible armed hold-up atttempt,” a guard told The National.
“They were not wrong because after leaving Murray Barracks the driver of one of the cars drove into the armoured vehicle and tried to block it. The other cars then surrounded the armoured vehicle but just about then, our escort vehicles arrived on the scene.”
In the shootout that ensued, one robber was shot in the head and another in the chest. Both died on the spot.
Their accomplices fled.
The expatriate is understood to be recovering from his shoulder wound.
A Protect officer said nothing was taken from the armoured vehicle.
He said the robbers appeared to have known their movements which suggested that they might have had “inside” information.
In another incident, a man was killed by a security guard when he tried to rob a clinic at Three Mile.