Owners of Toronto restaurant huddled inside office as shots rang out in front of their store

TORONTO -- The owners of a Toronto restaurant said they huddled inside their office as shots rang out near the front door of the store on Thursday evening.

The province’s police watchdog was called in to investigate after a man was shot during an interaction with Toronto police in Scarborough. At around 8 p.m., police encountered a vehicle of interest in the parking lot of Church’s Chicken, in the area of Midland Avenue and Eglinton Avenue East.

As officers attempted to block in the vehicle, the vehicle rammed into the police vehicles, the Special Investigations Unit (SIU) said in a statement.

There was an interaction and an officer discharged their firearm and struck one of two people they were investigating, Insp. Andy Singh told reporters Thursday evening. The two individuals were later taken into custody, police said.

“We stayed inside and we locked the front door and then the back one,” owner of Church’s Chicken, Sohail Chowdhary, told CTV News Toronto on Friday. He said a delivery person, who was in the store at the time, also hid with them in the office.

Chowdhary said they spent about 15 to 20 minutes in the office before a police officer came into the restaurant and asked them to close and leave the parking. They were not injured during the shooting.

Police said 31-year-old man was taken to hospital with serious but non-life threatening injuries. Two police officers were also taken to hospital with unknown injuries, the SIU said.

Three investigators and two forensic investigators have been assigned to the case.

The SIU investigates incidents involving police officers where there has been death, serious injury or allegations of sexual assault.

On Wednesday evening, a 25-year-old American man was fatally stabbed inside a building in the same area. Toronto police have not connected the two incidents.

The SIU is asking anyone with information to contact 1-800-787-8529. The unit is also asking anyone with video evidence related to this incident to upload it through the SIU website.

With files from CP24's Bryann Aguilar.