Fayetteville Clerk Savagely Beaten Fights Back

FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. — A store clerk was savagely beaten and left for dead at a Fayetteville gas station. She is recovering, but police are still looking for the attacker.

On Wednesday, the woman talked about her ordeal.

Betty Jean Carloni, 50, doesn’t normally work the overnights, but she did on Nov. 9. She was alone. Sometime before 5 a.m., a man walked in.

“He went after the beer, and I told him no beer, and he put it back,” Carloni said.

She couldn't sell beer after 2 a.m., according to state law. Carloni went to make coffee and the man went back for the Budweiser - two big cases. She warned him again that he could not buy the beer.

“And that’s when he came back around and swinging the beer at me and started going at me,” Carloni said. “He got me, drug me down and started smashing my head against the floor. He had both hands around my throat, hitting me against the floor.”

She threw some punches herself, but she eventually lost consciousness. The man kept beating her. When he was done, he swiped the cash register tray and cigars. When she regained consciousness, Carloni called 911.

“My whole face was fractured. My ear was ruptured. The jaw, the nose, all of it’s broke,” she said.

Carloni’s left eye was swollen shut for days, and she thought she might go blind.

“They were surprised I was not dead,” she said.

Police are looking for Anthony Darnell Lee, 31. He's wanted for attempted murder and assault, and he has a rap sheet, which includes hit and run, felony larceny, fleeing from police and breaking and entering.

The attack happened at a Hess-Wilco store on Raeford Road. Carloni said she plans to come back to the store at the end of the month to resume working.

“I’m not gonna be scared of nobody. I don’t care if they were to come back. I’d still fight,” she said.

Carloni said she has a message for her attacker.

“I would like to tell you, we’re gonna get you. And I’ve got a lot of people that do care, and they’re gonna watch out for you, and they will get you,” she said.