Crime & Safety

Tosa Woman Robbed of Her Purse in Village Lot

Purse-snatcher yanks victim to the ground as she tries to hold on to her handbag, she tells officers.

A young man followed a Wauwatosa woman from a restaurant and robbed her of her purse Wednesday in a Tosa Village parking lot, according to police reports.

At 8:50 p.m., the victim called police to report that she had been pulled to the ground and robbed in the lower city parking lot at 7735 Harwood Drive.

The woman told officers she had just had dinner at Café Hollander and was walking over the footbridge to her car when she noticed a man walking in the same direction. She had no suspicions at the time, she said, and thought he might have been a restaurant employee.

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She continued to her car, she said, and set some leftovers on the trunk while she dug in her purse for her keys. Suddenly, she said, the man appeared next to her, said something she could not recall, and grabbed her purse.

She still had her purse strap over her shoulder, she said, and tried to hold on. He yanked harder and she fell down, letting go the purse, she said. The woman was not injured in her fall.

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She said the robber ran off toward Watertown Plank Road. She described her assailant 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 had only a small amount of cash in her purse, and she immediately cancelled her credit cards.

Police are investigating the case as a strong-arm robbery.


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