Masked men rob casino boat
Source : www.newsday.com
Gary Gelman was outside the Majesty - a gambling ship docked on Nautical Mile in Freeport - when four gun-wielding men in ski masks ran by him about 7:30 p.m. last night.
Gelman, the owner of the Majestic Casino Cruise boat, yelled for them to stop, thinking they were late customers, he said, when one pointed a shotgun at his back and ordered him onto the ship.
“I was walking, telling him to stop, don’t do this,” Gelman said late last night. “He was telling me that he was going to shoot me because I was walking very slow.”
The four men boarded the boat and robbed it of more than a $100,000, Gelman said.
As Nassau police investigated the robbery last night, Gelman’s voice was still shaky as he spoke in a phone interview.
He said that while one man held a gun to his back - taking a $6,000 watch off his wrist - three others forced about 100 customers to lie on the floor while they robbed a teller of the boat’s cash on hand.
“The guy was holding the silver gun and telling everybody stay down and don’t move,” Gelman said.
The four men left as quickly as they came. “It was five to ten minutes,” said another worker, who didn’t give his name.
Gelman said the four men left in the grey Oldsmobile they arrived in. None of the at least 350 passengers, on board were injured, Gelman said.
The Majesty was built in 1998 and holds a maximum of 515 persons, according to the ship’s Web site. The 165-foot long boat has enough room for 23 table games and more than 200 slot machines.
It sails from the Woodcleft Canal in Freeport twice a day.