Customer: Canton Verizon worker acted heroically during robbery

Police in Canton nabbed three suspected robbers, but they aren't the only heroes stemming from a Monday hold-up at a Verizon store.  A customer is calling a Verizon worker a hero.

"When you're confronted with somebody with an automatic rifle like that, it's a horrible, horrible feeling," said Gerald Soubly.

He and his girlfriend were the only customers inside a Verizon store in Canton on Monday morning when a group of guys armed with automatic weapons showed up.

"Dan, who was the salesman, he sees the rifle, and he says, 'Call 9-1-1.  They're going to rob us.'  And these guys are banging on the door trying to get in," Soubly explained.  "And he pushed the doors closed in front of these guys, and he put the lock pin in.  Now he is facing these guys with this rifle.  He put himself in extreme danger."

"The guy with the AK-47, he starts hammering on the glass.  That didn't work, so he takes the rifle, and he fires the shot, and he breaks the glass open.  They come running in, and they start grabbing things," he added.

SkyFox was on the scene as Canton police conducted a city-wide manhunt.  The suspects' car was seen fleeing south on Oakview.  An officer rammed the vehicle.  Three men fled on foot, but police weren't far behind them following footprints in the freshly fallen snow right to a storm cellar.  All three were arrested.

"The report from Verizon was automatic weapons, and there's weapons in the vehicle that would be considered automatic weapons," said Sergeant Mark Gajeski.

Police sources told me these suspects will be questioned about similar crimes in Westland, Taylor, Garden City and Dearborn.

Soubly came back to Verizon on Tuesday to thank Dan for saving his life, but Dan had the day off.  So, instead, he told Fox 2, "I want to just say thank you for the kind of heroism."

Police said there is surveillance video that they collected from the Verizon store.  They turned that evidence over to the prosecutor.