This bungling thief was handed a painful lesson in the art of striking when the owner of the bar he was trying to steal from caught him red-handed.

The attempted robbery took place at around mid-day on August 5th at a bar in Rio Cuarto, Argentina and was captured on the establishment’s security cameras.

The footage shows the thief reaching behind the unattended bar as he attempts to steal from the till.

However, what he doesn’t know is that the owner of the bar has just spotted him in the act and is now about to deliver a healthy dose of street justice.

Approaching from behind, the bearded bar owner unleashes an open-handed slap to the side of the thief’s jaw, just as he’s turning around, and the blow buckles his legs and sends him slumping against a nearby bar stool.

The owner is holding something in his left hand, but that doesn’t seem to bother him as he’s more than capable of dealing with this lout with only his right fist, greeting the thief with a snapping jab as he gets to his feet, and then another blow that drops him back down to the floor.

The action goes off-screen momentarily, and then re-emerges on a different camera at a side entrance to the bar in what appears to be an enclosed garage area.

The owner is then seen dropping the thug two more times with punches, once to his knees and then flat on his butt.

This time when he gets upright the owner changes his approach, targeting his midsection with a body kick, then going upstairs with a head kick attempt as the humiliated robber finally makes it to the garage exit and flees the scene as fast as his wobbled legs will carry him.

The whole altercation lasted less than 30 seconds, yet the tough-as-nails owner was able to knock the criminal down no less than four times, and hopefully helped this low-life come to the painful realization that crime doesn’t pay.