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JOHNSTOWN - A masked robber made off with about $1,000 in cash after displaying a gun Thursday night at a convenience store on North Perry Street.

City police said at about 6 p.m., a white man wearing blue jeans, a brown sweatshirt and a green vest displayed what looked like a semi-automatic pistol and demanded the cashier hand over money.

The cashier was the only person in the store when the man entered. Police think the robber took off on foot and may have gotten into a vehicle after running some distance. A police dog, K-9 Spike, was brought to the scene but was unable to track the man, partially because of the rain Thursday night, Police Chief Gregory Horning said.

"He probably had some sort of transportation in place," Horning said. "Whether the clerk didn't notice the vehicle or the suspect got into the car he had up the street or in the area is unclear."

Horning said officers interviewed eight people who were in the area during the robbery but did not come to any definite conclusions.

"Right now, we don't have any new leads," he said. "Nothing panned out [with the interviews]."

Police said they have security video footage from the store, but they would not release it to the media today.

Store employee Cynthia Ashcroft said there have been a few robberies over the years at the store. She was not working at the time of the robbery but said she lives just a few houses away. She said around the time of the robbery, her dog became distraught and started barking a lot, which she said is unusual.

"He let out a yell like you wouldn't believe," she said. "A little while later, we saw the [police] car drive past."

Ashcroft said while she has never been in the store at the time of a robbery, she was not surprised to hear it happened.

"I kind of figured it was going to happen sooner or later, with the economy the way it is," she said.

Ashcroft said she opened the store at 5 a.m. today. Everything is back to normal there, she said.

"There are a lot of people coming in asking what happened," she said.

Kayleigh Karutis can be reached at gloversville@leaderherald.com.