74th St-Broadway subway station and the suspect (Wikipedia via Harrison Leong under CC BY-SA 4.0 and the NYPD)
March 8, 2021 By Michael Dorgan
Police are searching for a woman who allegedly snatched a wallet from a straphanger inside the 74th Street–Roosevelt subway station in January – and then used the victim’s debit card to buy items at a liquor store.
The thief approached a 52-year-old woman inside the station on Jan. 15 at around 7 p.m. and swiped the wallet from her pocketbook, according to police.
The suspect then got on a train and later exited the subway system at the Grand Avenue–Newtown station in Elmhurst, which is primarily served by the M and R trains.
She then used the victim’s debit card to make a purchase worth $219 at Spade Wine and Spirits, located at 86-34A Broadway, which is about a block away from the Grand Avenue–Newtown station.
The suspect is described as being between 40 and 50 years of age, 5 feet tall and weighing around 200 pounds. She is light-skinned and was last seen wearing a black jacket; a black shirt with “Columbia” imprinted in white letters across the chest; black pants; a gray knit cap; and gray sneakers.
Police released an image of the suspect taken from CCTV footage.
There were no injuries reported as a result of the incident, police said.
Anyone with information in regard to the identity of the individual is asked to call the NYPD’s Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).
The public can also submit their tips by logging onto the CrimeStoppers website at WWW.NYPDCRIMESTOPPERS.COM, or on Twitter @NYPDTips or by texting their tips to 274637 (CRIMES) then enter TIP577.
