Police and deputies throughout the valley are looking for a group of armed robbers who have held up at least eight motels in the past four days.
They threaten and sometimes beat the clerks, grab money, and leave.
Monday night they held up the Best Western in Firebaugh.
CBS47 spoke with the clerk who was on duty
“It just happened really fast. They weren't here even five minutes,” the clerk said.
She didn’t want us to show her face or use her name.
She told us two men and a woman walked into the lobby and behind the counter.
“The one that had the gun he had this open already, the register. He had a pink backpack and he told me to put all the money in here and hurry, hurry.”
She wanted to run. But they called her into the back office and told her to open the safe.
“I told him I don't have the key, I don't have the key and that's when he hit me in the face,” the clerk said.
She was beaten and told to lie down on the floor. Then the robbers left.
Investigators say the crime spree in the valley started Saturday night at the Parkland Motel on Parkway Drive. Then the Holiday Inn off Highway 99 was hit.
From there the thieves moved down the 99 to Selma and Kingsburg.
Then they went over to Interstate Five, hitting hotels in Coalinga and the Best Western in Firebaugh.
The crime spree continued up Interstate 5 to Santa Nella and Patterson, north of Merced.
“All had similarities, that's why the detectives were looking at all of them together,” said Deputy Chris Curtice with the Fresno Sheriff’s Department.
The hotels are stepping up security.
One is installing security cameras.
And they are locking their lobbies earlier and only using the night window to have contact with customers.
The suspects are described as two African-American men, one tall, one medium height, and a petite African-American woman. They were in a light color (silver or tan) compact car, possibly a Dodge Stratus.
