Updated Sun., June 25: On Fri., June 23, police reported that they have arrested a suspect in a pair of recent muggings at the Spring St. C/E subway station. Kevin Williams, 34, of E. 125th St., was charged with two counts of first-degree robbery.
According to the Daily News, Williams’s mother spotted him in a surveillance video that was released by police. She told a friend, who reportedly went to the cops.
Williams lives in a homeless shelter, which the Daily News reported is in Harlem. But a First Precinct police officer told The Villager it’s actually on the Bowery.
Police say Williams robbed two middle-aged women at knifepoint in the late-morning hours on the Uptown side of the C/E subway station at Spring St. and Sixth Ave. Each time, he grabbed the victim from behind and put a white cloth over her nose and mouth, while brandishing a blade.
The first robbery occurred Tues., June 13, at 10:53 a.m., when the stranger grabbed a 50-year-old woman using the above M.O. and removed $70 from her before fleeing southbound toward Sixth Ave.
Then, on Sat., June 17, at 10 a.m., the suspect grabbed a 49-year-old woman from behind as she was walking up the stairway to exit the station. He again covered her nose and mouth with a cloth and held a knife, causing her to drop her purse to the ground. The attacker swiped $75 cash from it and fled, reportedly through the underpass to the station’s Downtown side.
There were no reported injuries in either incident. The Daily News said there was no harmful substance on the cloth either time.
Following the attacks, police — including undercovers — were posted inside and outside the station. Lucy Brinkerhoff, a barista at The Frog’s Crown cafe, across the street from the subway entrance, told a TV news reporter that she was there for the second mugging and heard the victim give “five or six bloodcurdling screams.”
$5 phone ransom
A woman lost her iPhone at the W. Fourth St. subway station and the finder tried to sell it back to her — for the grand sum of $5, which was enough to get him busted on a felony charge due to the phone’s value.
On Thurs., June 15, at 10:40 p.m., the phone’s owner, 33, received a message from her friend that a man had found it at the station and would only return it if he was paid $5. It was arranged for the woman and suspect to meet at the subway station at 14th St. and Eighth Ave., where he was arrested. David Patti, 30, was charged with felony grand larceny.
Bad credit
According to police, a man was using stolen credit cards to make unauthorized purchases at a Duane Reade near E. Ninth St. last Wednesday. On June 14, at 4:37 a.m., while making an arrest inside 769 Broadway, an officer spotted a credit card with a name different from the suspect’s name. The card’s owner told police that there were two unauthorized purchases on his account. The suspect claimed he found the debit card. He was caught on camera making the two unauthorized purchases.
Landon Palmer, 36, was arrested for felony grand larceny.
Goes too far at Fargo
Police said a man tried to use fake ID to deposit a stolen check at the Wells Fargo branch at 475 Sixth Ave. on Mon., June 12, at 12:55 p.m. He also reportedly had other fake ID and debit cards.
Matthew Mixson, 32, was charged with felony criminal possession of a forged instrument.
Bulb boob busted
Police have arrested the third suspect in a Feb. 17 light-bulb attack on a teen at Seravalli Playground, at Gansevoort and Hudson Sts. Ethan Rufli, 16, was collared Mon., June 12, and charged with felony assault.
In the incident, the victim, 16, was hanging out in the Village park at 3:15 p.m., when the trio of toughs bashed him with the bulbs, causing glass shards to get into his eyes.
Ousmane Niambele, 16, and Francisco Serrano, 17, were previously arrested March 22 and April 25, respectively.
Tabia Robinson
and Lincoln Anderson
