Raleigh, N.C. — Business was slow Friday evening at Tarbouch Mediterranean Cuisine on Creedmoor Road, so restaurateur Yusef Howa decided to move his car and lock his walk-in cooler. That change in routine may have saved his life when police and a man wanted for murder clashed just outside his back door.

"The police surrounded the area from my cooler to about 50 to 100 feet," Howa said.

Officers had tied Matthew Durwood Calton to a fatal shooting earlier in the day, and they had tracked him to the shopping center at 5633 Creedmoor Road. Police asked Howa and other shopkeepers to lock their doors and stay inside for about 30 minutes as they pinned Calton down.

Then, a half dozen shots rang out.

"We could hear them distinctly, and they sounded a lot more powerful than just a handgun," Howa said.

Calton had fired on officers, hitting one in the arm. One officer got a shot off that hit Calton. Both injured men were taken to WakeMed. Harmon was discharged Sunday. Calton was in fair condition.

"It surprised me," Howa said. "The guy was hiding behind our store."

According to Raleigh police, Calton shot and killed Jay Gould Simmons, 53, Friday afternoon as he sat in his pickup truck outside the Carquest store at 2635 E. Millbrook Road. The two men knew each other, police said, but they did not offer a motive for the crime.

Calton faces a murder charge and will be taken into police custody when he is released from the hospital.