A 27-year-old man was saved from almost certain death earlier this week when a calculator and mobile phone in his shirt pocket stopped a bullet from piercing his chest.
According to police, Naoaki Miyazaki, assistant manager of the Aoki Super Isshikishimmachi supermarket in Nakagawa Ward, Nagoya, was shot in the chest by Kim Jung Gam, a South Korean national, as he and two other employees were chasing Kim across the store's parking lot Monday evening.
Kim had just shot the store manager, who was outside the store with the day's receipts of about 10 million yen, and was fleeing with the cash.
Takahiro Sano, the 38-year-old manager of the store, was shot in the side and seriously wounded, police said.
Miyazaki was hit in the chest, but the bullet bore through a memo pad and the pocket calculator in his chest pocket and lodged in the mobile phone, which was immediately behind it.
A supermarket official quoted Miyazaki as saying he thought it was a toy gun because he did not feel any pain even though he had been shot, and he kept chasing the assailant and managed to subdue him together with the two others. Miyazaki was surprised when told that the gun was real.
Police arrested Kim, who is around 65 years old, for robbery and attempted murder and are grilling him over how he obtained the gun, which was a .38-caliber revolver.