Features

Police Blotter

By Richard Brenneman
Thursday August 20, 2009 - 11:10:00 AM

Two angry men in search of money attacked victims in the Telegraph Avenue area last week, one armed with a stun gun and the other with a lead-lined glove, according to campus police. 

The first robbery took place at Telegraph Avenue near Channing Way at about 1:15 a.m. last Wednesday, Aug. 12. A man walking along Telegraph “was shocked on the back of his neck by a stun gun,” according to the Crime Alert issued later that day by the UC Police Department. 

The robbers were both clad in jeans; one wore a green hoodie, the other a black hoodie. Both men are described as in their early 20s. The pair fled south on foot along the avenue. 

“The victim was not seriously injured during the encounter,” the alert stated.  

The second robbery that same day was more conventional, with the robber brandishing a knife as he strode up to a teenager waiting at a bus stop at Telegraph and Durant avenues. 

The youth handed over his cash when the robber demanded it, and the armed felon walked away, heading west on Durant. 

He was described as a bald, deep-voiced African-American with a goatee, about 30 years old, standing about 6’4” and weighing about 200 pounds. He was wearing a black hoodie with a zipper, gray baggy jeans, white Nikes and a silver medal with a chain around his neck. 

In both cases, campus police joined their city counterparts in unsuccessful area searches for the culprits. 

Anyone with information about the robberies is urged to call UCPD’s Criminal Investigation Bureau between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. at 642-0472, or 642-6760 after hours. 

The third incident of the week followed on Friday morning in People’s Park and ended with the arrest of 34-year-old Travis Barrett Williams on one count of assault with a deadly weapon—the device in question being a “sap glove,” otherwise described as “a lead weighted-knuckle glove” in the Crime Alert, 

His victim was a 23-year-old man who was in the park at 7:30 a.m. when Williams, an acquaintance, walked up, made a lead-enhanced fist, then popped him twice in the face. 

“The suspect attempted to extort money from the victim with more physical violence if he did not return to the park with cash,” the alert states. 

The victim left the park and headed to the nearest campus cop. 

An investigation followed, ending with Williams’s arrest three days later.