Two university graduate students were reportedly robbed last night when they were walking near the Graduate Hills Apartments in the 3400 block of Tulane Drive, police said.
Two males allegedly approached the females at 9:40 p.m. One of the suspects pushed one of the victims to the ground and demanded her property, University Police spokesman Capt. Marc Limansky said. Both women, who are 23 and 25 years old, complied, and the suspects allegedly fled the scene with their purses, Limansky said.
Because the case is still under investigation, police declined to disclose what was in the purses. Except for a minor knee scrape, the victims were not injured during the incident, Limansky said.
University Police swarmed the area last night but were not able to locate the two suspects, whom the victims described only as black males, Limansky said.
“We’re going to do everything possible to locate these individuals and continue to have a police presence in that area in an effort to get more information and gather potential witnesses,” he said.
Last night’s robbery was the first incident to result in a crime alert in more than a month, which Limansky said is partly due to University Police’s vigilance.
Several students who received the crime alert email Wednesday morning said they felt uneasy about walking around the campus in the dark.
“It worries me that students are not safe to walk around campus and the surrounding areas after nightfall,” junior environmental science and policy major Chelsea Benney said. “Many students are out studying until late hours and it scares me that incidents like this happen.”
egan@umdbk.com
