By Stephanie Farr
The Philadelphia Daily News
CHESTER, Pa. — Two armed home invaders were swept away yesterday by a Chester homeowner who chased them off with a broom, according to police.
Shortly after midnight, the two young, unidentified men broke into a house on Madison Street near 22nd owned by an Asian family that runs a convenience store in the city, Chester Police Capt. Stephen Fox said.
After the men broke in through a rear window, a 49-year-old male resident of the house went downstairs to investigate and wound up with his hands and feet tied with a belt and an extension cord, police said.
When the man’s 80-year-old father came downstairs, he was robbed of $50 and held at gunpoint, Fox said.
According to Fox, the men were then confronted by the 43-year-old woman in the house, who chased them out with a broom as they started to make their way upstairs.
Reached at her store last night, however, the woman told a Daily News reporter that it was actually her husband who chased the men out of the house and that she was in the shower at the time of the incident.
She then said she was rushing off to visit him at the hospital.
The 49-year-old man suffered a broken ankle when he tried to escape, and the robbers made off with only the $50 they took from the elderly man, Fox said.
The residents were unable to provide descriptions of the robbers to police.
The home invasion comes on the heels of a community-outreach forum in Delaware County earlier this month to raise awareness of home invasions in the Asian community.
During the forum, Delaware County District Attorney G. Michael Green said that in the last three months, 11 home invasions have targeted Asian-American business owners in Philadelphia and the surrounding suburbs — six of which have occurred in Delaware County.
Asian-American business owners are targeted by criminals who believe — falsely or not — that they will not call the cops and that they keep money in their homes, Green said.
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