Spectacular manhunt follows Crown Heights mugging
By Yitzchok Wagshul – Editor of Crown Heights Chronicle, on behalf of SHOMRIM CROWN HEIGHTS DIVISION and crownheights.info
A spectacular manhunt Wednesday morning shook up the routine of residents on Montgomery and Crown Streets between Albany and Troy Avenues, as police searched for two young men who had just attempted to mug a woman at gunpoint.
At approximately 9:15 a.m., the victim was walking to work along Montgomery Street between Kingston and Brooklyn Avenues, when she noticed two black males across the street from her acting suspiciously. They were talking in a conspiratorial way and gave her the impression that they were eying a bicycle chained to a corner up ahead. Each wore white mesh shirts and one wore a white kerchief, or “do-rag,” over his head.
As the woman walked, one of the youths crossed the street diagonally in front of her. However, instead of continuing, he abruptly turned and rushed towards her, shouting “Give me your bag, you ….”
Hearing this, the victim grabbed for her purse. At the same time, the mugger grasped it also, and, meeting resistance, he pointed a gun at her and pulled the trigger twice. However, boruch Hashem, it only clicked harmlessly.
The victim, who later described the gun as black with a little gray and having two barrels, told the us she is not a gun expert and did not know whether it was real or not. However, hearing the clicks, she assumed it was a toy and lost her fear. She remembered thinking, “You’re threatening me with this toy gun? Am I supposed to be afraid of that?” Accordingly, she grabbed her purse again and tried to wrest it from the attacker’s grasp. Unable to get it easily, the mugger let go and fled along Montgomery Street towards Kingston Avenue.
In the meanwhile, his friend, who had remained across the street, walked slowly along towards Kingston, pretending to be uninvolved in the crime.
Before the perpetrator got away, the victim saw a bochur running up from behind. Hoping to delay the attacker just long enough for help to arrive, the woman reached out and grabbed at the fleeing youth’s shirt. It tore in the struggle and the mugger escaped, leaving behind a piece of white fabric.
The bochur, Nosson Losh, 20, had been sitting on his porch in his slippers when he saw the commotion, and called to another bochur rushing to the scene to ask what was going on. Learning that a mugger was escaping, Losh kicked off his slippers and chased after the criminal, pursuing him barefoot all the way to Kingston Avenue. According to Losh, who is considerably larger than the assailant, “I was only about a foot away from him and was about to take him down when he pointed a gun at my head and said, ‘Get the hell out of here.’” At that point, Losh took cover behind a car and called police as the robber got away, first heading up Kingston Avenue, then doubling back after rejoining his partner and walking along Montgomery Street towards Albany Avenue.
The bochur, whose father, Yosef Losh, is one of the gabboim of 770, sustained cuts above the toes from his barefoot chase.
While all this was going on, the attempted robbery victim remained at the scene of the attack, screaming for help. A passing Con Edison truck backed up and offered her a cell phone with which to call police. From where she stood on Montgomery Street, she could see the criminals making their way up the road towards Albany Avenue, walking slowly, stopping people as though to ask the time, and otherwise trying to blend in; and she passed that information on to the police. Shortly thereafter, HATZOLOH DISPATCH called the SHOMRIM hotline. When they arrived on scene, SHOMRIM volunteer Bentzion Turk, drove her to where three police cars had converged at Montgomery Street between Albany and Troy Avenues.
The robbers had disappeared, and were presumed to be hiding somewhere within the large undeveloped area, formerly the site of the Crown Palace Hotel, between Montgomery and Crown Streets. Police from the NYPD’s elite Emergency Services Unit were called in, along with a police helicopter and canine unit, and for over an hour, they searched that square block of land.
Early on, police broke down the door of the abandoned building on the corner of Crown Street and Troy Avenue, and found within two individuals: a homeless person squatting on the premises, and a young black male wearing no clothing from the waist up. The victim, who had been waiting in a police car, was brought to identify the youth. At first, she said she could not positively identify him because the person who robbed her had worn a white kerchief while this person, although of the same age and build, had an afro and no kerchief. However, police informed her that they had, in fact, also found just such a kerchief, and the woman requested that the suspect be asked to put it on. When she saw him again with the kerchief, she recognized him at once as one of her attackers, and he was arrested.
At approximately 10:30, the woman went to the 71st Precinct and filed her report, after which she finally went to work. An hour or two later, she was informed by police that the second perpetrator had been arrested as well. Each suspect, according to reports, fingered the other as the actual gunman. On Thursday, she appeared in court to press charges.
“The police tried very hard to find the muggers,” said the victim. “I especially appreciated how respectful and considerate they were to me, turning on the air conditioning in the car I was in, and in general being so sweet after my upsetting experience.”
Informed sources believe the perpetrators arrested Wednesday were the same people who mugged a 16 or 17 year old bochur at around 11:45 the previous Thursday night on Albany Avenue and President Street, and may also be responsible for the serious beating of another bochur that Shabbos on Kingston Avenue near Montgomery Street, after finding he carried no money.
SHOMRIM would like to thank HATZOLOH for working hand in hand with all the SHOMRIM units especially over the last few days with the recent muggings in our area.
If you hear or see anything suspicious or a danger to people’s lives don’t hesitate to call the SHOMRIM hotline on 718 774 3333 including shabbos if it’s a question of pikuach nefesh you can call
