Nine students robbed at gunpoint inside Midvale apartment Sunday
By Sonali Kohli
Jan. 4, 2010 9:45 p.m.
Nine students were robbed by a man at gunpoint on Sunday night in an apartment at 433 Midvale Ave, according to university police.
The gunman, who has not been caught, stole three laptops, five wallets, five cell phones and at least one iPod, according to several of the students.
At 9:30 p.m., there was a knock at the door of an apartment, according to a university police crime alert. One of the residents opened the door to an Asian man in his mid-20s, who proceeded to brandish a firearm, according to the alert. Two students said they quickly went to another room after the man entered with the gun.
The other seven students were told to get on the floor and were patted down in the living room by the robber one by one, then were sent to other rooms in the apartment, said Charley Walton, a fourth-year chemical engineering student and a resident of the apartment.
The robber then said, “Nobody come out or I’ll pop a cap in your ass!” according to fourth-year design and media arts student James Turner, also a resident of the apartment. About 11 minutes after he arrived, the robber left, Turner said.
Police said they received a call at 9:41 p.m., immediately after the robber left, and officers arrived at the apartment in a matter of minutes.
Police notified other apartment residents directly following the robbery and posted a crime alert on their Web site Monday afternoon. According to university police Captain John Adams, police were working on releasing more notifications and fliers to the UCLA community Monday afternoon.
A BruinAlert was not sent out because students were not in immediate danger as nobody was physically hurt during the robbery, Adams said.
“We don’t want to alarm everyone that’s out there, since people get (BruinAlerts) who aren’t even in the area,” he said. “We want to get (a notification) to the people it directly affects at the time.”
Adams said it is a possibility that the robber was a UCLA student, but said many robberies in Los Angeles are committed by people in this age group. He said it is likely that the individual left the area right away after the robbery.
“A robbery is a very difficult case to solve when you don’t have many leads and not too much physical evidence,” Adams said. “We’re hoping to get this man off the street.”
University police notified LAPD and asked them to increase patrols in the area. Police are working with victims to draft a composite sketch of the robber and will release more information once it is available.
Students who were in the apartment during the robbery said they are still shaken by the events of Sunday night.
“We were all shocked,” Turner said. “I thought, “˜Wow, did we really just get robbed at gunpoint?'”
Visiting New York University student Kaitlyn O’Brien, who left the room when the gunman arrived, said the only emotion she had time to feel was panic, as her boyfriend was in the room with the robber.
“I thought he was going to kill someone,” O’Brien said. “Luckily it was just a robbery, but a poorly executed one.”
