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Les Lehmann, a Canadian who was residing in the Dominican Republic managing an apartment complex and was shot Friday, January 31st during an armed robbery of the complex, shows his wounds and speaks to media about his injuries and recovery in Winnipeg, Friday, June 6, 2014.JOHN WOODS/The Canadian Press

For someone who was shot several times at point-blank range during a home invasion in the tropics, Les Lehmann is making a remarkable recovery.

Mr. Lehmann, 64, says even the doctors who treated him after the attack in January at a small apartment complex in the Dominican Republic were surprised.

"The doctors were sort of shaking their heads the next day. They thought there were nine wounds in me and it turned out there were 10," Mr. Lehmann told reporters assembled Friday in the backyard of his son and daughter-in-law's home in suburban Winnipeg.

"But they said there were no bullets in me and [the thieves] didn't hit anything vital – didn't hit my head, didn't hit my chest, didn't hit my stomach."

Mr. Lehmann was shot while he was hosting a group of Manitoba students who were doing humanitarian work. The attack was captured on surveillance video, which shows two men kicking open a door to Mr. Lehmann's residence and one entering.

Moments later, Mr. Lehmann is seen chasing one with a baseball bat and striking him. The second man emerges with a handgun. There is a brief struggle in which Mr. Lehmann tries to swing the bat at the armed man, who shoots several times. Mr. Lehmann falls and starts bleeding, the two men run off and help arrives several minutes later.

What is not shown on the video, Mr. Lehmann said, is an initial confrontation inside in which he grabbed a machete, was shot at and stomped on several times.

Mr. Lehmann was initially taken to a hospital in the Dominican Republic. His family raised funds to cover the cost of his care, which topped $1,200 a day.

When he returned to Canada, he moved in with relatives. Now walking with a cane, he undergoes three or four hours of physiotherapy a day. Nerve damage has made it hard for him to make a fist with one hand, but he is expecting to make a full recovery in the coming year or two.

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