Masked men rob Houston Hall Burger King

University and Philadelphia police detectives are searching for the armed robbers, who stole $1,550. Two masked men armed with handguns robbed the Burger King in Houston Hall late Tuesday night after sneaking into the building through an emergency exit, police said. No one was injured in the incident. A Burger King district manager said the men stole $1,550 in cash from the building at 3417 Spruce Street. The perpetrators then fled west on foot, University Police Det. Commander Tom King said. Neither suspect has been arrested. University Police detectives and the Philadelphia Police Department's Southwest Detectives bureau are currently investigating the robbery, King said. Four employees of the basement fast-food restaurant were cleaning the store shortly after the store closed at 11 p.m. when two men in their late twenties wearing ski masks entered the food-preparation area through an open emergency exit, according to King. The men proceeded to hold a gun to a female employee's head, threatening to shoot her if she did not direct them to the store's safe, Burger King district manager John Myers said. The employee was "too nervous" to remember the combination, but another employee opened the safe, Myers said. After taking about $1,550 in cash, the perpetrators ordered the employees into the store's walk-in refrigerator and fled the building, he said. Although the two suspects allegedly placed boxes up against the door to the refrigerator, the employees managed to shove open the door and hit a panic alarm, alerting University Police, Myers said. No one outside the store witnessed the incident, which occurred after the building was locked for the evening at 11 p.m., Myers said. He said no one else was in the basement of the building at the time. Police described one suspect as a 6'5" black male with a light complexion, short black hair and a long navy blue coat. The other was described as a 5'10" black male with a dark complexion, a short afro and a red jacket. Police are currently trying to determine how the suspects were able to enter the building through an emergency door -- which Myers said is "broken" -- without setting off an alarm. Detectives began questioning former employees of the store yesterday as possible suspects in the incident, Myers said. But Myers said he thought it was unlikely that either of the suspects are former employees of the Burger King because they did not initially know where the safe was.

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