Minneapolis students help convenience store owner after arson, robbery

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A Minneapolis community is coming together to help a local convenience store owner rebuild after his store was apparently robbed and set on fire.

Now, high school students are raising money for the owner of CK convenience store.

Owner Marin Onuh bought the convenience store and gas station in 2010; it was his slice of the American dream.

“It’s really a mess,” Onuh said.

Onuh wonders who would do this and how he’ll recover.

“I don’t have insurance because last year I had about six break-ins and my insurance dropped me,” he said.

It appears that someone broke in again and started a fire outside of the store. 

Onuh found out when he walked over to open up around 6:30 a.m. Sunday and saw the fire trucks outside.

“I was just saying to myself ‘I hope this is not the store,’ and it turned out to be the store. So, I run up here and they told me that somebody lit it up,” he said.

“What would they gain in burning it…what are they trying to prove?”

The store is a fixture not just for the neighborhood, but for students from nearby Washburn High School.

“This is where everybody comes, especially during lunch. Some of us can’t afford the lunch and we have to pay for it. We come here and buy snacks; this is like a second home for us Washburn kids,” said Frankie Flores.

So, Washburn students began a GoFundMe campaign with a goal of $10,000 to help him repair and rebuild. So far, they've raised nearly $8,000.

“Even on the weekends we’d come here just to say what’s up, just to visit him, check on him,” Tyron Anderson said.

Onuh is not just the owner, he’s the only employee - here every day from morning until night.