Las Vegas police are searching for a woman they say killed a nail salon worker with a stolen car after refusing to pay for her $35 manicure on Saturday.
The victim, 51-year-old Nhu "Annie" Ngoc Q. Nguyen — a mother to three daughters — was trying to stop the customer from leaving after her credit card was declined, police told CBS News. The woman drove her vehicle into Nguyen and dragged her briefly behind the car before taking off.
Nguyen died from multiple blunt-force injuries, according to the Clark County Coroner's Office.
Police are investigating the crime as a murder and are still working to identify the suspect, Officer Larry Hadfield told CBS News.
Authorities found the car, a rental that had been stolen three weeks ago, abandoned at an apartment complex nearby, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported. Officials don't believe the person who originally rented the car was connected to the crime.
Police Lt. Ray Spencer told the newspaper that the customer had said she was going to her car to retrieve more money after her credit card was declined — then attempted to drive away. At that point, Nguyen and another employee went outside to try to prevent her from leaving.
Sonny Chung, who had lived with Nguyen for 13 years and helped run the salon, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that he had tried to hold the car back.
“But I'm not Superman,” he said. “She ran off for $35 and killed my wife — $35 to run my wife over.”
A GoFundMe page for Nguyen's family, set up by one of her three daughters, had raised more than $10,000 by Tuesday. Nguyen had two grandchildren.
The page identified Nguyen as “a dutiful mother who always put her children first before herself.”
“She had been constantly putting in 12-14 hrs a day, 7 days a week, to send her daughters to college and to support her mother, siblings, and grandchildren,” her daughter wrote. “Allowing them to have a greater opportunity in life, she worked endlessly.”
BuzzFeed News has reached out to the Las Vegas police and Nguyen's family.