West Village Thieves Also Hit Midtown 3 Times In Past Month: Police

WEST VILLAGE, NY — A group of thieves who struck a West Houston Street smoke shop earlier this week may have also been holding up Midtown shops over the past month, police said late Wednesday.

In addition to Tuesday's robbery, where a group of four — including one who suggested he was armed — made off with $1,400, officials contend the same group could be involved in three other Midtown robberies that saw a total of nearly $20,000 in stolen goods and cash.

The robberies began April 30, when two people stole more than $4,000 from a Ninth Avenue shop near 34th Street about 3 a.m. after flashing a firearm at a clerk, police said, adding that the robbers also took the clerk's watch before feeling in a white sedan.

A few weeks later on May 12, four men entered a business on Eighth Avenue near West 29th Street, flashed a gun once again — plus a knife — and made off with $6,500 in cash and goods, police said. The group fled in a red Hyundai Sonata, according to police.

The final Midtown rob was just days later on May 19, when the group of four struck a West 29th Street shop at 4 a.m., police said. Once inside, one of the men suggested he was armed and the group proceeded to take $6,700 in goods, plus $800 in cash, before fleeing in a black Kia Soul, according to officials.

No injuries were reported from any of the incidents, police said.

People with information are asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).