Not Really Biting The Hand That Feeds You So Much As Jumping Over The Counter And Shooting It Off

Despite how they make it sound, Bedford-Stuyvesant really is a tight-knit neighborhood:

There are video cameras watching the counter all the time. The monitors are wrapped in clear plastic to keep them clean. Most of the other Chinese restaurants nearby also have thick plexiglass shields between the cashier and the customer, like a gas station or a liquor store, but not Happy House. Longtime customers, presumably the very people who would be the most offended by beefed-up security, tell [Gigi] Wong they need more.

“They need, like, a partition here with a window,” said a matronly woman who gave only her first name, Lorna. “People are stupid. They always kill the ones that help them.”

To Ms. Wong, she said, “If that was you they shot, I would have cried.”

So new was the cashier that, after the shooting, no one in the Wong family seemed to know her full name, only her last name, Lin. Before the shooting, when Gigi Wong had tried to speak to her at work, they would be constantly interrupted by customers.

And the kicker:

The man, Raymond Wiliams, 21, was identified on the security video tape as the gunman leaping over the counter, according to a criminal complaint filed in court. The police are looking for another man who may have been involved, the complaint says.

Mr. Williams has been charged with attempted murder, assault, menacing and harassment, and remained in jail as of yesterday. He admitted he leaped over the counter and fired two shots, according to the complaint.

Ms. Wong did not recognize his name.

But she was stunned to learn of his address, 210 Stuyvesant Avenue, right around the corner from the restaurant.

“We deliver to that address,” she said. “Every single day.”

Robbing a Chinese takeout is not particularly smart. Robbing your neighborhood Chinese takeout . . . nice.