Police are asking for the public's help in identifying the robbers who bound two victims with duct tape and threatened to kill them during a holdup at a Roseville cigarettes online shop.
The four culprits filled garbage bags with online cigarettes and stole more than $10,000 in cash at approximately 2:30 p.m. Monday at J & W Smoke House, on Utica Road near 13 Mile Road, Deputy Police Chief James Berlin said.
One of the robbers held a male store clerk at gunpoint while an accomplice bound the man with tape, police said. As the robbers began emptying shelves, a relative of the clerk arrived to bring lunch to him.
"Wrong place, wrong time," Berlin said.
The woman was forced to the floor at gunpoint and bound, and the robbers continued to ransack the store.
"They threatened to kill (the victims) if they called the cops or looked up," the deputy chief said.
After the robbers fled, the discount cigarette online store clerk was able to break loose.
One of the gunmen is described as black, 25-30 years old, approximately 5 feet, 11 inches tall, 180 pounds with a short black afro, mustache and a bandage on his left temple. He brandished a blue steel semi-automatic pistol and wore a green T-shirt and blue jeans.
Police describe a second robber as a black male in his late 20s, about 5 feet, 9 inches tall, approximately 165 pounds with a light mustache. He wore a green baseball cap, a black T-shirt with an Old English "D", green pants and black gym shoes.
Officials have no description of the other two accomplices.
Investigators Thursday are trying to determine whether the robbers are responsible for a holdup spree at metro area cheap cigarettes shops in recent weeks, Berlin said.
Anyone with information about Monday's incident is asked to call the Roseville Police Department at (586) 447-4483.
Meantime, Warren police have no suspects in the robbery of a 42-year-old woman outside the House of Rueben restaurant on Eight Mile, east of Schoenherr Road, at approximately 8:30 p.m. Wednesday.
The Roseville woman was walking to her vehicle when two men approached her from an alley. She complied when she was ordered to hand over her purse, police said.
"They were both shaking and both pointing small black handguns toward her," Warren Detective Lt. Dan Beck said.
The robbers fled back to the alley. Both are described as black, approximately 19 years old, 5 feet, 7 inches tall and 125 pounds. One wore a black hooded sweatshirt and the other culprit had a blue hooded sweatshirt.
The woman was not injured in the incident, police said.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
