Macon clerk was slumped over, dying when cops arrived

The gunmen who shot and killed a clerk at Gary Food Mart in southwest Macon early Saturday barged in during shift change.

When the police got there the killers were gone and the clerk’s pulse was fading.

Prakash Patel was shot multiple times by the pair of shooters as they entered the store. New details about the 40-year-old clerk’s slaying were made public on Tuesday in a Bibb County sheriff’s report.

Another clerk, Braji Pati, was in the store with Patel at 1:25 a.m. when the gunmen burst into the food mart at 3306 Bloomfield Drive. The store sits at the intersection of Williamson Road, less than a mile south of Eisenhower Parkway.

According to the report, Pati, 23, saw the men come in. He later told investigators that one of the bandits had a “big gun,” a sawed-off shotgun. The other was armed with a silver handgun.

One of the suspects opened fire at Pati but missed.

Pati said the gunmen then climbed through an open security window on the store’s counter and took an undisclosed amount of cash.

The pair shot at Patel multiple times, striking him in the chest and left arm before running out of the store, leaving Patel dying, “slumped over on his knees,” the report noted.

His pulse was faint when authorities found him. They tried to revive him but couldn’t.

Police on Tuesday were still looking for the gunmen, who were described as black men wearing hoodies with bandanas over their faces.

Three hours before the robbery, two men matching the suspects’ description carjacked someone in a 2008 Saturn Vue. That incident happened at Reliance Food Mart at 3590 Mumford Road, about four miles north of Gary Food Mart.

Investigators believe that the car was used in the shooting on Bloomfield Drive. The driver of the Saturn was not hurt in the carjacking.

This story was originally published June 21, 2016 at 5:36 PM with the headline "Macon clerk was slumped over, dying when cops arrived."