The pastor of the Linden Church of Christ recounted on Monday how he advanced on a gunman even though he had already been shot and the man was still firing at him.

Pastor Nigel Milo was discharged from the Linden Hospital Complex on Sunday after he was shot twice during a hair-raising encounter with an armed bandit however police said no arrests have been made.

Bandits accosted and robbed the pastor, a family of four, three men who were enjoying a drink and two others of cash and other items in an encounter that sent tremors through Central Amelia’s Ward on Saturday night.

Sitting in the comfort of his home and surrounded by family, Milo gave thanks for his life even as he recalled his experience with the bandits. He told Stabroek News that on the said night he had gone over to the church building to ensure that it was properly secured since he remembered that the doors were closed but had not been locked.

“I had just stepped out of the gate (and) I heard someone say ‘don’t move’. I looked over the road and saw some guys who are usually there whenever the owner of the house comes into the country sitting at the front of the yard so I thought for a moment that it was one of them. I looked at the guy and said to him -`you got to be joking’,” Milo explained. He said he soon saw that the man had a revolver and within seconds the bandit had fired the gun hitting him in the upper thigh. The bullet then exited his body. “Again I said to him – you got to be a mad man – and I started walking towards him [and] he fired the second shot that hit me on the reverse side of my right palm,” Milo recalled.

The pastor said though he had been hit twice he continued to advance at the gunman who then fired another two other shots at him before running off into a nearby yard. He said he walked towards his bus which he had parked in front of the church compound, and as he was entering it the gunman again approached him. Milo said he had left the bus engine on and on seeing the gunman’s intentions “I turned the van wheels in his direction and he realized that I was going to drive straight on to him he turned and ran through the same yard again.”

Milo said he circled the area in the hope of spotting the bandit and he encountered the group of men who had been liming by the church. He said when he enquired why they did not come to his aid they related to him that they too had been robbed. According to Milo they told him that three gunmen had attacked them. Two of the gunmen reportedly fled the scene after Milo’s attacker ran. The pastor said he circled the area once more before calling his wife who was at their home a short distance away. He said he went home, administered some first aid to his wounds and alerted some of his church members before he was taken to the Mackenzie Hospital. The pastor said the bullet in his right hand had broken two bones. He was admitted to the hospital for one night and was discharged Sunday midday.

While there have been whispers about who may have carried out the brazen attack, the Mackenzie police said no one has come forward with any serious information and no one has been arrested.