August 4, 2007 -- Investigators said a string of bodega robberies in Queens - including one that left a father of seven daughters dead - is likely not the work of a single group of thugs, but two or more sets of bandits, authorities said yesterday.
While detectives believe the fatal June 11 shooting of bodega owner Bolivar Cruz in South Ozone Park was connected to at least two of the other robberies, they are not sure the same group of thugs committed the others, sources said.
Complicating matters, a third group may have been responsible for another bodega robbery, in Springfield Gardens Thursday, in a store that has been hit three times this year.
"Whenever [the cops] come, they say, 'It happened again? We feel so bad.' They're trying their best," said Tassidaq Butt, who owns the Great Supermarket on 144th Avenue.
He said two armed men burst into his store Thursday afternoon, and one wore a blue bandanna over his face - something similar to bandits in many of the other robberies.
He said one of them was black and the other Hispanic and came in with a gun drawn, screaming, "Give me the f---ing money or I'm going to shoot you!"
