ATLANTA -- Atlanta police are hunting for an armed robber who holds up convenience stores while hiding his face behind a clown mask.
    
WSB-TV reports there's nothing amusing about the masked outlaw. Police say he's been known to pistol-whip store clerks and has fired warning shots into walls and a chair.
    
Atlanta police Sgt. Prenzina Span says the man in the clown mask fired his gun during his last two robberies. Span says the robber seems to become violent when his victims don't respond fast enough to his demands for money.
    
The robber is known to target stores in the Cleveland Avenue area of southwest Atlanta and seems to strike early in the morning, between 6 and 8:30 a.m.

Associated Press