A 7-Eleven clerk who was fatally shot in Whittier Saturday was identified by family members Sunday as a father and husband who moved to the country to provide for his family back in India.
Maninder Singh Sahi was identified by family members as the victim who was killed Saturday around 5:45 a.m. at a 7-Eleven located at 8438 Santa Fe Springs Road. The Whittier Police Department confirmed the identification of the victim and said he was in his 20s.
Sahi was shot with a semi-automatic handgun by a man with a partially covered face, who entered the 7-Eleven store that he worked at with the intent to commit a robbery, police said. The robber shot Sahi even though police say he appeared to be cooperating with him in surveillance video.
Authorities are still seeking the robber, who got away on foot with an unknown amount of cash. Police released stills from surveillance video showing the robber, who they describe as a black man about 5 feet, 6 inches tall, wearing a dark hoody on top of a gray hoodie at the time of the incident.
After police informed the victim’s wife and mother, who are both in India, about Sahi’s death, they were both hospitalized due to “nervous breakdowns,” according to Lt. Dominic Iraldo.
Sahi came to the country to provide financial support to his family in India, the lieutenant said. He has two children, ages 5 and 9, who also live in India, a GoFundMe page set up by family members who live in the U.S. says.
The fundraising page was set up to raise money for Sahi’s funeral expenses and for sending his body back to the country for burial.
Sahi’s family in India will be left homeless since he was the sole breadwinner of the household, according to Rupinder Kaur, the wife of the victim’s cousin.
Kaur says her and her husband were the only family Sahi had in the U.S.
“In the short time he was in California, he never argued with anyone and never raised his voice. He quietly did all the work his boss told him and he never complained,” the fundraising page says.
The GoFundMe page, created Sunday morning, had raised more than $21,000 by the evening.
Anyone with information about the incident can contact detectives at 562-567-9281. Tips may also be submitted anonymously to L.A. Regional Crime Stoppers at 800-222-8477.
