Another Victim Robbed in Village Parking Lot

For the second time in less than three weeks, someone has been robbed in the lower city parking lot in Tosa Village, but this time in broad daylight and with the threat of a weapon.

It is also the third recent robbery attempt in the Village area, as another had been reported not far away on State Street the same night as the first incident in the city parking lot.

According to police reports made available Monday:

A Milwaukee man reported Friday that he was robbed that morning by two men in the lower city parking lot on the southwest side of the Village area, at 7735 Harwood Ave.

At about 9:30 a.m., he said, he was walking back to his car after finishing a job servicing a printer at Aurora Psychiatric Hospital when, without warning, he felt something cold and hard pressed to the back of his head.

He froze in fear, he told police, while the two robbers patted him down and took his wallet, cell phone and watch. He turned slowly after they left, he said, and saw two “shadows” running back toward Harwood.

The victim, with no phone, panicked and drove home to the south side of Milwaukee without reporting the crime, because, he said, he was so frightened he just wanted to get out of there.

He did not, in fact, report the crime until after 5:17 p.m., when he appeared at the police station. He told officers he never looked directly at his assailants and could provide no description of them except that both wear wearing dark hoodies, blue jeans and dark-colored or dirty running shoes.

He said he did not know whether the object pressed to his head was in fact a gun or not. Police are treating it as an armed robbery, and even the false impression of the threat of a weapon in a robbery is treated as a more serious offense than when none is implied.

The victim was not injured in the episode.

Other recent incidents in Village area

A Wauwatosa woman was robbed of her purse in the same parking lot on the night of Oct. 17 after leaving Cafe Hollander.

She saw only one assailant, whom she described as as “a nice looking kid,” white, in his mid-20s, 5-feet-9 or 5-feet-10-inches tall, of average build, with brown hair, wearing blue jeans and a dark blue windbreaker with the hood up. She said the windbreaker was light blue on the inside of the hood. The woman was not injured, although she fell to the ground, and the purse-snatcher did not imply that he had a weapon.

Another woman later reported to police that on that same night, Oct. 17, and just 20 minutes earlier, two young men had tried to rob her while she was walking on State Street between North 70th and 68th streets after visiting Outpost Natural Foods.

The two approached her from behind, she said, and one told her, “I want your money. I want your money for food.” She looked back at them and said, “I don’t have any money.”

The same suspect then said, “We have a gun,” while his silent companion made a gesture as if pointing a weapon and then reached into his pocket.

The woman said she panicked and simply ran away as fast as she could and made it into the corner mall on the northwest corner at 68th and State, where there were plenty of people around. She looked back and could no longer see the suspects, she said.

She described the suspect who spoke to her as white, 20 to 25 years old, 5-feet-8 to 5-feet-10 in height, weighing about 175 to 185 pounds, with almost shoulder-length brown hair and wearing dark clothing.

The second was also white and 20 to 25 years old, 5-feet-10 to 5-feet-11, 170 to 180 pounds, also wearing dark clothing, she told police.

The woman believed she would recognize the subject who spoke to her if she saw him again.