Community Post

Woman Screaming at 27th and E. Union – UPDATE: Robbed at gunpoint

Last night at about 11:30pm I heard a woman screaming in the ally at about 27th and E. Union. Then there followed what sounded like several gun shots from a small caliber weapon. Within minutes there were at least three squad cars in the area, as well as police dogs. What the heck happened and why can’t I find anything out about this incident?

EDITOR’S UPDATE: A woman on her way to the airport was robbed and assaulted while waiting at the bus stop on the north side of Union near 27th Ave, according to the police report.

The three suspects walked past her around 11:30 p.m., then doubled back around a building and came through a wooden gate in the fence behind her. One of the suspects pointed a black, semi-automatic handgun at her and told her to “be quiet.” He is described as a black male in his 20s, 6’1″ with a slim build, short hair, black baseball cap, while polo shirt with black trim around the collar and black baggy jeans.

The woman began screaming, and the man with the gun punched her in the face. The other two men then pushed her to the ground and tried to take her black messenger bag, dragging her across the sidewalk in the process.

A passer by saw what was happening and came to her aid. The witness was able to grab the first suspect, but the suspect swung his arm and escaped. The other two suspects fled the scene with the woman’s bag and orange suitcase. Despite a K9 search, they were not located.

Among the stolen items were her MacBook laptop, $3,000 in cash, her wallet and airline tickets, according to the report.

Police provided her with a courtesy transport to Seatac Airport.

52 thoughts on “Woman Screaming at 27th and E. Union – UPDATE: Robbed at gunpoint

  1. I inquired about it this morning. It’s marked as a street robbery with a gun. Should have more information soon.

  2. Thanks so much, Tom. I hope it was without injury.(Posted w/out reading your update – thanks for the information.)

  3. Don’t carry laptops or cash in CD. Certainly use a taxi to get to a safe light rail stop it to the airport. $50 is cheap insurance against the kind of assault that regularly happens in the neighborhood.

    Really sorry for this lady’s misfortune.

  4. butch: she was going on vacation. I’m not surprised she was carrying that much $$.
    That is really awful and I hope she is OK.

  5. Please read again before judging or handing out advice. The woman had just left her home to catch a ride to the airport. How do you advise that she get her laptop to the airport with her and the luggage in this case besides carrying it from her front door to her ride? Ship it via UPS? Armchair advice is moronic when you don’t read details. Oh yah, and light rail is not a haven for safety at that hour just FYI. (not that it’s even on topic to this subject).

  6. She obviously did read the article and the facts because it says- “while waiting at the bus stop on the north side of Union near 27th Ave”
    It also says there was time for the suspects to walk past her, around a building and get back to her.
    Maybe you should read the article.

  7. So without wallet or airline tickets SPD took her to the airport? My ID would have been in my wallet, I don’t think SeaTac could do much to help without it.

    Shuttle Express is $37 for a door pick up to the airport.

  8. $45 or so gets you a taxi to the airport from your front door. I find it surprising that someone who lives around here would feel safe at that time of night alone at a bus stop (or walking down the street), especially with cash and valuables. I hope she’s ok.

  9. Saying people should expect to get robbed in a certain neighborhood is sort of parallel to saying one should expect to get raped for wearing a certain dress. Instead of blaming the victim here we should be calling for change in the neighborhood.

  10. The problem is, you can expect to be a victim by conspicuously waiting on the sidewalk / near public transit in CD. To do otherwise while carrying valuables is wishful thinking.

    I am not blaming the victim at all, just raising awareness to others who might be planning a trip.

    It would be nice if we had a right to safety in CD, but we have to live and survive in reality. In reality, the CD will get you burned when you’re vulnerable.

  11. Kyleen – but that’s just it. You can expect to possibly get robbed in many neighborhoods, not just the CD.

    downtown, cap hill, pioneer square, U district. even places like Wallingford and Ballard have street crime probs. check the SPD crime reports and compare to the CD.

    don’t think the CD is the only dangerous place around here. it’s not.

  12. Agreed, spiffy d. Other places, like the U District, seem to have way more random violent crime. But no neightborhood should expect for this to happen.

    Out of curiosity, does anyone know if SPD tracks and shares demographics of victims of crimes like this? Like, was she young, old, small, tall, what was her race, etc. I tend to have a confidence about taking risks at night/alone because I am a tall, athletic woman with a presence. Maybe people won’t mess with me. I am sure I am wrong.

    Either way, I love our neighborhood and hope that the selfless acts of kindness like the driver who stopped to help continue.

  13. Heard the whole thing go down and am really glad no one was badly injured. But…I really want to believe we live in a world where no one is going to mug you or assault you….but we sure do not. I don’t want to blame the victim, but wow that’s a lot of dough to have on you and take the bus.

  14. $400 will get you a Glock 9mm sub-compact pistol and $35!will get you a concealed weapons permit. It does take an extra 15 minutes to check your firearm with TSA but you will have a choice to use deadly force when someone points a gun at you in the future.

    My recommendation is to wait till they lower their weapon or turn, then calmly pull your weapon and fire 2 quick rounds into each suspect. A couple of 8 hour self defense courses in gun safety and the legal aspects of deadly force in Washington state are highly recommended.

    Anonymity is never a good defense against attack even with the extremely low odds of being robbed and/or mugged.

  15. GO TO THE $23 MILLION DOLLAR BOONDOGGLE URBAN LEAGUE VILLAGE AND ASK THE RESIDENTS AND THE “NORTHWEST AFRICAN AMERICAN MUSEUM” (NAAM SCAM)WHAT THIS PROJECT HAS DONE TO CREATE A CULTURE OF PEACE IN AFRICATOWN/CENTRAL DISTRICT FOR ALL WHO LIVE HERE????? I DON’T EVEN HAVE TO GET THE DETAILS TO KNOW THE “COLOR” OF THE VICTIM AND THE “COLOR” OF THE VICTIM (KEEP THIS HUSH HUSH). YES BECAUSE OF PAST HISTORICAL VICTIMIZATION OF AFRICANS BY EUROPEAN SETTLER COLONIAL JUDEO-CHRISTIAN GUN/DRONE TERRORISM THE LONG HOT SUMMERS OF THE 1960S HAS TURNED INTO A SLOW BURNING KIDS KILLING KIDS, KIDS ROBBING AND BRUTALIZING HEAD IN THE SAND “THE NAKED KING IS SO WELL DRESSED” POLITICALLY CORRECT INSANITY! THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE INVESTIGATION OF THE SEATTLE POLICE PROTECTORS OF THE ORGANIZED RICO RACKETEERING CRIME NETWORK IN SEATTLE (READ THE BOOK “ON THE TAKE” BY WILLIAM CHAMBLISS)HAS IDENTIFIED THE ROOTS OF THE “CULTURE OF VIOLENCE” IN AFRICATOWN/CENTRAL DISTRICT!!! THOSE OF US LONG TERM AFRI9CATOWN/CENTRAL DISTRICT RESIDENCE THAT HAVE FOUGHT OVER 50 YEARS PROMOTE CULTURAL ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT IN THIS AREA HAVE BEEN MET WITH PRODUCTIVE SWAT TEAMS AND TANK ATTACKS ON THE AFRICAN AMERICAN HERITAGE MUSEUM AND CULTURE CENTER AT THE FORMER COLMAN SCHOOL SITE (JUNE TH 1998), CIA DISTRIBUTED “CRACK COCAINE” (CRACK HOUSES) SPRANG UP IN BLACK AFRICATOWNS ACROSS AMERICA TARGET FOR ETHNIC CLEANSING/GENTRIFICATION??? WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MINDS WOULD MOVE INTO AND THEN STAY IN THE OVER HEATING CULTURALLY OPPRESSED/SUPPRESED (REDLINED OW WHITELINED) RACE WAR ZONES??? PUT A POLICE ON EVERY CORNER AND YOU HAVE MORE JOHN T. WILLIAMS AND AARON ROBERTS MURDERSS BY ORGANIZED CRIME ENFORCERS/HITMEN/PATROLMEN PATROLLING FOR “RUN AWAY SLAVES”!!!! ADOLPH HITLERS NEWS MEDIA LIKE TODAY’S FASCIST CORPORATE MEDIA (DON’T SHOW PICTURES OF WAR DEAD OR GIVE DAILY BODY COUNTS OF ENEMY KILLED OR CASKETS OF RETURNING AMERICAN WAR HEROES). YES “OUT OF SITE OUT OF MIND” INJUSTICE IS HARD TO IGNORE WHEN THE STENCH OF DECAYING BODIES REACHES YOUR/OUR NEIGHBORHOODS!!! OMARI TAHIR, 66 YEAR AFRICATOWN/CENTRAL DISTRICT HISTORIAN AND WORLD TRAVELER (INCLUDING FASCIST GERMANY, ITALY AND JAPAN). EUROPEANS NEED TO PUT DOWN THEIR WHITE SUPREMACY “CRACK PIPES” AND BEGIN BUILDING A SOCIETY BASED ON JUSTICE AND CARING AND NOT WALL STREET STOCK TRADING! YES AFRICAN “SLAVES” WERE THE “LIVE STOCK” TRADED THAT LAID THE FOUNDATION FOR EURO-AMERICAN COLONIAL WEALTH OR IS HISTORY FASCIST EURO-NAZI GOEBBELS PROPAGANDA. BY THE WAY ARE THERE STILL HUMAN BEINGS IN THE US CONCENTRATION CAMP AT GUATANAMO BAY AND “BLACK HOUSES” AROUND THE WORLD? JUST ASKING??????

  16. I’m just hung up on the fact that SPD took her to the airport.

    Imagine: You’ve just lost $3,000 and your computer. You’ve got no plane tickets now. You’ve got no ID.

    It’s probably at least 12:30AM by now, after the cops have come and dealt with everything. What, exactly, are you going to do at the airport?

    You’re not getting on a plane without tickets. It’s possible that they were e-tickets, but you aren’t getting those re-printed without ID. Even if you could, you’re not getting through TSA without ID. End of story.

  17. I heard the rounds fired, too. I heard two sets, totaling at least 10. Where in the story is that part explained? Did the robbers fire them in the air? Please fill us in when the details are explained more by the SPD.

  18. Do you mean last night (Thursday) or Wednesday night (when this robbery happened)? The police report makes no mention of any shots fired.

  19. I thought I heard two sets of shots (the screaming stopped immediately after) but another neighbor said there were no shots. So challenging to know the truth.

  20. I live in a second floor apartment across the street from where this happened and rushed to my window as soon as I saw this happening. I looked down and saw a young blonde woman struggling with 4 black men. One had a gun pointed at her while the other 3 were kicking and punching her repeatedly. By the time I made it downstairs and across the street 3 other young men were at her side to help and the assaulters had fled. The woman attacked was an incredibly sweet girl in her 30’s who is attending UW to be a physician’s assistant. She had moved here not long ago and was on her way to Tucson to see her boyfriend. I was there when she gave her report to the police and I also gave my account of the story. I do not remember her say she had $3K, I’m pretty sure she said she had a few hundred dollars so maybe an extra zero got added in.

    As someone who was there and talked with this woman please trust me when I say she did nothing wrong and you all that have been critizing her are just horrible. This poor girl was just going about her business and trying to get home for a school break. Now she has no textbooks, clothes, money or computer for next semester. I hope that the university can provide her with some support because she seemed like she had a bright future ahead of her. She mentioned to one of the young men that came to help that she used to be a paramedic. I hope her experience handling stressful situations helps her get over this.

    This was an incredibly sad thing to have happened and for all of you who heard her screams and did nothing I hope you sleep well at night. And for all of you that can sit here and comment on what “she should have done” I say the same. This world of ours is a mess, we need to be nice to each other.

  21. Each person makes his/her own decisions as to their behavior. Stop blaming the crimes of one race against the past actions of another. People with your mindset are part of the problem, not the solution.

    Oh, and IT’S CONSIDERED RUDE TO TYPE IN ALL CAPS. DB.

  22. Excuse me? So you’re saying it’s her own fault?
    It’s time to stop making excuses and clean up the neighborhood.

    I carry a laptop with me for work. What am I supposed to do, move? Is it going to make the neighborhood better when all respectable people have moved out?

  23. I’m not rich by any means but I’ve gone on vacation with alot of moeny like that too. I usually lock up some in the hotel safe. Maybe she was going somewhere that credit cards and traveler checks would be hard to use. So sad for her, and bad timing. I have a friend that works for TSA and he said that in a situatation like this they would have still let her through security. With a police report she would have just gone through a really detailed check.

  24. I heard the shots last night – I didn’t realize that the robbery happened the night before.

  25. Thank you, Patrice for sharing. I hope she knows about CDNews and knows that she can reach out to the broader community for support if needed. I’m sure there is someone around here who has been to school for Medical Assisting and can help out!

  26. JimmyCap,
    You have got to be kidding me. Several people are criticizing her decision to take a bus, carry cash, and carry her computer. Every time somebody gets robbed, assaulted or harmed it is par for the course that they get blamed by a few commenters on CD news. (That being said, this is also the norm on Capitol Hill News).

    Patrice, thanks for sharing what you witnessed. It adds perspective to this horrific story.

  27. Four men attacking a woman. Cowardly societal rejects that will end up in the morgue sooner or later. Hopefully sooner.

  28. Hey Ya’ll.
    I want to chime in here because the victim in this crime was my roommate. I was not home at the time. If I had been, my baseball bat would be broken in half.

    She is new to Seattle and was flying home for vacation. The police took her so she would arrive safely (she was injured) and so she would be able to get on an airplane without ID. There are procedures in place for situations like this….

    What really bothers me so much (I’ve lived in Seattle for over 3 decades) is that these young guys acted deliberately, ganging up on her. It wasn’t enough to rob her. They had to beat her and drag her into the alley. If strangers hadn’t come to her rescue, she may have been raped or killed. My hat is off to those guys. I’m sure they are fed up like the rest of us. They responded and risked themselves! In some neighborhoods I’m sure people would have opted to not get involved. At least we have strong souls in the CD that aren’t going to put up with this BS!! Thank you, guys… I want to meet you and buy you a round, hug you and thank you in person for saving my friend.

    I was on my way home from SeaTac myself a few weeks ago. Transferred from the LINK to #8 bus and at about Jackson, several young guys got on the bus and ran past an elderly lady trying to pay her fare… NONE OF THEM PAID. They just ran to the back of the bus like they owned it. I was like, damn, since when are young black men exempt from paying bus fare? This little old lady was trying to get her money out and they almost knocked her over.
    What’s up with all these beautiful young people wasting themselves on being violent, arrogant, entitled, and rude?! We need to do something as a society. The bus driver, older black man, who might just be the only person they would have respected… just let them be. He just shook his head…I’m sure he didn’t want to risk starting static, but damn… I wish he would have enforced the rules. there were like 13 of them. It made the other passengers feel sick.

    So I get off at the Grocery Outlet and so do about 5 of them. I walk 1 block home. A few minutes later, those guys walk past our unit and smash out my other roommates window of his truck. People, we have to have each other’s backs. Senseless violence has got to stop!

  29. I was critisizing her but got deleted, so, I’ll try to say it again less offensively than I meant to.

    We continue to hide our heads in the sand. We continue to pretend that crime is not running amok in our hood. We critisize those who say it is. We hear person after perrson step up and say they feel “perrfectly safe” walking the CD.

    Yes, let’s all put this behind us. It’s just a little thing, not likely to happen to me.

    Ignorance of truth of our comunity could have gotten that young woman and her defenders killed. Creeps are lurking on our streets. They look like bad guys because they are bad guys. If you don’t want me to think you are a bad guy, pull up your pants, get your hand off your junk (get some antifungal spray if it itches). In other words – walk like a human being instead a walking pair of underpants.

    Let’s get these pukes of our streets. Let’s tell the truth to our young women that it is dangerous as hell out there. Stop being naive and foolish, you are begging to be victimized.

  30. Thanks for the info MD. I hope everyone here takes your points seriously. She was very lucky for the rescue. How’s she doing?

    Neighbors! Do you here this? There are hundreds of these young men and women roaming the streets. We all want to think they are just good kids, but, they are lost. They are lost because we allow them to be. Enforce the rules, tell them to pull their pants up and act repectable. If they have to act respectfully they may become responsible citizens and actually be able to hold a job. Letting the steal and mope around means they will never be able to hold a job.

    They’ll talk all nice to you one minute, then flip a switch and out comes the creep.

  31. feeding the troll i know… but you gotta stop with the stereotyping Dumbo. if you didn’t know me you’d probably think i was a skinhead. unfortunately i went bald at 25, so i shave my head. the combat boots and all black clothes probably don’t help but it’s what i like to wear. i sure hope i don’t get jumped for these reasons one day, and i sure hope you don’t shoot some 13 year old looking for a ball in your yard because he happens to dress like his favorite MC. baggy pants do not equal criminal, that’s just stupid ignorance on your part sir.

  32. That’s interesting hunter. Make it out like I’m killing people. Who’s side are you on. In case you haven’t noticed gaings are killing, robbing, raping. People in the CD support, promote, and glorify gangs. What I’m saying is people should reckognize this problem in their children and push them to have a little respect. The kids around here are 40-70% doomed to going nowhere. You want them to continue looking and acting like gang groupies? That means no – job, no where, not ever. I’m suggesting we help them. In case you haven’t notices I’m not running around killing 13 year olds as you so disgustingly suggested. The gangs will take care of the killing so long as you keep letting them. And nobody suspects you of being a skin head because there are no skin heads. Has anybody in Seattle ever been killed by a skin head? Certainly not a problem here today if it ever was. The problem is BGD and Bloods and the creaple that enable, promote, shelter, and defend them. You are the problem. I would love to hire some qualified young people for some good hard work my company needs done. But slouchy punks are not going to get the job.

  33. No kidding. You creeps can’t even call yourselves MEN if you 4 on 1 attack and rob a woman.

  34. MD – Please tell your roommate that Seattle welcomes her, and we’re so very sorry that this happened to her. Tell her please to reach out here, on this site if needed, if she needs support. I’ve lived in the Cd all my life and though I’ve had my house robbed, and my car stolen, my only beating and robbery occurred on 1st and Pike. I was a teenager at the wrong place, wrong time, full of too much confidence. It was a horrible, horrible thing to be beaten and robbed. Please do tell her we’re all pulling for her! If she needs her stolen goods replaced, she should create a Facebook cause. I would donate!

  35. Saddened to hear about your roommate’s attack. Not the norm for the neighbhorhood, but unfortunately seems to be more prevalent this summer. I hope she continues on with her studies & is able to get past this traumatic event. While this neighborhood does have a few who seem to commit random acts of violence, they are definitely a minority.

    Unfortunately for society her attackers may be beyond help but she is not. I live in the neighborhood and work in one of the nearby hospitals as many in this neighborhood do. I would be happy to help your roommate out & think many others would as well, Maybe a donation account could be set up for her at a local bank?

    I would hate for this horrid act of violence to deter your roommate from her future.

  36. Why are we saying that violence and robbery are not the norm for this neighborhood. It seems quite the norm to me.

  37. I know the woman. She is tall (nearly 6 foot) and athletic, and definitely has a presence. So it sort of sounds like if you were in the same place in the same time, your personal characteristics wouldn’t have prevented you from becoming a victim. :(