An employee of the Water Works car wash at 807 N. Western Ave. was assaulted and bound at the wrist and ankles with duct tape during a robbery Thursday morning.
The employee was opening the business around 7:45 a.m. when a man dressed in all black and wearing a ski mask stuck an unknown object in his back and demanded money. A second man was apparently involved with the robbery.
The employee was struck several times in the head with what he described as a 3-foot brass or copper club. He opened two safes inside the business and the robbers left the victim on the floor with his ankles, wrists and mouth bound with duct tape. They fled on foot in an unknown direction.
The employee wriggled across the floor to a phone and called the police, according to the police report.
The employee was treated at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria for injuries to his head and released.
