Liq-store Tenn. gran nails ‘thief’

Tough-talking, alleged shoplifter-shooting, 88-yearold Nashville liquor store owner May Boyce wants criminals to know “I’m fed up and I’m not taking it anymore.”

The octogenarian (inset) was back at work Saturday after being charged with aggravated assault for shooting a man she said was trying to steal whiskey.

“I did what I had to do and I hope word gets out . . . that I’m fed up and I’m not taking it anymore,” she told The Post from her store.

Boyce said she’s been robbed a number of times in the past.

Now out on $10,000 bond, said she finally had enough Tuesday night when two men came into her Murfreesboro Road Liquor and Wines store, menacing her and trying to steal some booze.

That’s when she grabbed her late mother Mary’s .38 Smith & Wesson snub nose revolver and placed it on the counter.

One of the men asked for brown liquor and the other, identified as Ramon Fisher, grabbed a couple of Crown Royal whiskey bottles. Boyce then confronted Fisher who she said “lunged” at her.

Boyce, a widow who stands 5-foot-3 and weighs 115 pounds, said Fisher was going to push her down. He then ran for the exit, the bottles under his arm, she said.

“I did what I had to do,” she said. “After you’ve been played for a fool by people stealin’ from you for years, you get fed up.”

Nashville police did not return calls from The Post asking about if Boyce overreacted by shooting Fisher, who is recovering from his wounds in a hospital. Police said that Fisher first told them that he had been high on cocaine and liquor at the time he entered the store and intended to steal, but later insisted he and his friend planned to pay for the booze.

Boyce is upset only that the cops confiscated her gun, and told her it might be two years before she can get it back.

“I told ’em, s--t, I might be dead by then,” Boyce said.