Halloween this year made for some spooky behavior from some of Baltimore’s teenagers. Police say they’ve nabbed six teens in assorted robbery and carjacking incidents from this past Sunday and Monday.
In one set of arrests, police detained four juveniles, ages 14, 15, 16 and 17, who they say threatened a woman at gunpoint and tried to take her car in Reservoir Hill. In that case, the victim told a dispatcher the quartet surrounded her car in the 2000 block of W. Park Avenue, banged on the doors and windows and grabbed at the door handles. She fled the scene and later talked to police.
When officers showed up at that spot on Park Avenue, a citizen told them a group was trying to steal other cars nearby. Police found them soon after in the 700 block of Reservoir Street. They arrested all four. The black handgun turned out to be a fake, which officers seized from the youngest member of the crew.
In addition to those four, police said today that they arrested a pair 14-year-olds who allegedly started a robbery and carjacking spree in Bolton Hill and finished in East Baltimore’s Gay Street neighborhood. A man told police around 5 p.m. on Sunday that two individuals approached him at gunpoint and told him to get out of his car in the 100 block of E. Lanvale Street. Three of their friends then popped up, robbed him and climbed into his Ford Focus, after which they all sped off.
The next day, police got three more calls about robbery incidents connected to the group over a three-hour period. Around 1 p.m., a man told officers in the 1600 block of E. Eager Street that two suspects, seemingly the same ones, had tried to rob him. Soon after, officers tracked down the pair nearby and chased them. Ultimately, they arrested them and recovered the stolen Focus.
Their three friends were not with them at the time, Lt. Jarron Jackson of the Baltimore Police Department confirmed, adding that police are investigating whether other juveniles may have taken part in the string of crimes. Speaking on the arrests, Jackson said the situation is “two-fold.”
“On one hand, we’re very happy we’re able to make arrests and return property to Baltimore’s citizens,” he said. “It’s also very unfortunate that the criminal actors in the crimes are juveniles.”
Jackson said he couldn’t speak to whether the arrival of Halloween made it a more unruly weekend, but he noted that because of the holiday, police “had an increased uniformed presence throughout the city.”
One shouldn’t be surprised if they hear about more carjackings as the year continues. They’re up 44 percent compared to this point in 2015, according to police data.
