By Tien-Shun Lee
Two men dressed in gray pushed their way into a Bayside home, bound and gagged a woman with duct tape before forcing her at gunpoint to turn over $3,000 cash and some jewelry Monday at around 11 a.m., the victim said.
“I have some lumps here and a bruised hand,” said the 66-year-old victim, pointing to bruises around her left eye. “Thank God it’s not big damage.”
No arrests have been made in connection with the robbery, police said.
According to Arapis, the incident began at around 10:55 a.m. when one of the robbers rang the doorbell to her house at Corporal Kennedy Street near 39th Avenue. She was alone in the house at the time and expecting a visit from one of her children.
When the woman opened the door, one of the men put his foot in the doorway and then forced his way into the house, followed by his partner. Once inside, the two men bound her wrists and legs with duct tape and placed duct tape over her mouth.
One of the men, described by the victim as a young, possibly Hispanic man with a round face and wearing a gray uniform, pointed a gun to her head and told her, “If you don’t give me money, I’m going to kill you,” said the victim’s husband, 65, who was at work in Jamaica at the time of the robbery.
The other man was wearing a gray jumpsuit with loose pants and a mask, the woman said.
She said the two men forced her up the stairs at gunpoint after cutting open some of the duct tape around her legs so she could walk better. They searched the drawers in all three of the family’s bedrooms and took about $3,000 in cash, in addition to four watches, some jewelry and gold cuff links.
After going through the bedrooms, the robbers headed to the basement of the house with the woman. From the basement, she escaped outside through a side door and began yelling for help.
The two men then fled out the front door and ran down Corporal Kennedy Street, the woman said.
When she saw that the men had left, she went back inside her house and called her husband, before calling the police, she said.
After talking with police, she and her husband went to Flushing Medical Center, where doctors examined her bruises.
“As long as she’s all right, that’s the most important thing anyway,” her husband said.
The couple have lived in their two-story house in Bayside for 32 years, her husband said. Twenty years ago their house was burglarized, but no one was at home at the time, he added.
Reach reporter Tien-Shun Lee by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com, or call 718-229-0300, Ext. 155.
