Two students were assaulted and robbed in Lot 1B on Friday afternoon, police said, and two 16-year-olds were arrested nearby shortly afterward in connection with the crime.

In what police believe to be the first broad-daylight mugging on the campus in more than a year, the two students — both men — were attacked by a teen who approached them on a bicycle as they were getting into their car parked near Knight Hall, University Police spokesman Capt. Marc Limansky said.

The students were walking back from the University Health Center at about 3 p.m. when a teenager came up behind them and accused them of talking about his mother.

The students ignored him and got into the front seats of their black four-door Toyota, but the teen — who police do not believe knew the students — climbed into the passenger side of the back seat and continued to badger them.

When the driver came around to the rear passenger door and told the teen to get out of the car, the teen punched the student in the face, knocking him to the ground, then got into the driver’s seat and began punching the other student, who remained in the passenger’s seat, Limansky said.

He then grabbed the second student’s iPhone and rode off with another teenager on bicycles, Limansky said, adding the students suffered minor injuries.

The students and a passerby who witnessed the robbery immediately called police with a description of the robbers and their bicycles, and University Police broadcast an alert, Limansky said.

Police stopped one of the two suspects at the corner of Adelphi and Toledo roads about a mile and a half from the robbery scene, Limansky said, and soon got word that someone had run into the nearby Prince George’s County Community Center. Police found that suspect in the building’s bathroom with the stolen iPhone, he added.

The victims and the witness all identified the two 16-year-olds as the muggers, who were charged with robbery, assault and theft, Limansky said. Although police believe only one of the two suspects was a direct participant, police spokesman Paul Dillon said both conspirators are equally responsible under the law.

Because they were charged as juveniles, Limansky would not identify them except to say one of them lives nearby in Riverdale.

Neither is suspected of committing any other on-campus crimes, he added, crediting the arrest and the recovery of the iPhone to “good police work” and the timely and coordinated response of the officers.

Limansky noted that the robbery was unusual for the College Park area; most recent muggings have occurred late at night blocks away from the campus itself. The students therefore had no reason to believe they were about to become victims, he said.

“They were walking together at a time of day when their guard would be down,” Limansky said. “It was just a brazen thing.”

Sophomore computer science major Molly Li said she was “not too comfortable” about the idea of a mugging occurring on the campus in the middle of the day.

“I usually avoid walking around at night because I know something like this could happen and I’ve heard about it happening,” Li said. “But broad daylight — that’s just a little disconcerting.”

Junior computer science and finance major Edward Tsao said although the daytime mugging was unusual, he was “not surprised” to hear about it.

“You kinda get enough police reports from Prince George’s County Police to kind of expect this stuff to happen,” Tsao said.

However, Limansky said that in spite of the “smattering of occurrences” of crime in College Park, “statistically, it’s a very safe campus.”

Police said the last similar crime occurred last May when a female student was robbed of her book bag as she crossed a street near South Campus Commons at 11 a.m. — a mugging that remains unsolved.

In other recent crime news, two students and their non-student companion were cited for shooting fireworks off the roof of the Mowatt Lane parking garage at 1:35 a.m. last Thursday. Officers saw fireworks and stopped the three men in the garage’s stairwell, police said. One of them admitted to setting off one firework.

Police also stopped a man on Knox Road near Cornerstone Grill and Loft who they said was cursing at and mooning nearby pedestrians around 1 a.m. Friday. Adrian Lamont Moten, a 22-year-old student from Hyattsville, was cited but not arrested for disorderly conduct, police said.

And Friday afternoon, police said a man assaulted a university parking enforcement officer after the officer ticketed truck, which was illegally parked between Marie Mount Hall and the Skinner Building.

The man yelled profanities at the officer and swatted at his face, grazing the officer’s cheek, and then briefly blocked in the parking enforcement vehicle with his own truck when the officer tried to leave, police said. Because the officer wasn’t injured, he decided not to file charges, police said.

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