The masked gunmen who robbed a College Point dollar store and tied up three employees on Sunday morning may be connected to a south Queens robbery pattern, police said on Thursday.
In a post to the 109th Precinct‘s Twitter account, Inspector Judith Harrison published a wanted poster with the image of a man believed to have involved in the Feb. 25 caper, which occurred at 8:30 a.m. inside the Dollar General shop located at 132-13 14th Road.
The flier noted that the incident was “incorporated” into a citywide robbery pattern that the NYPD established earlier this year. The pattern involves three armed robberies that occurred in Jamaica and Richmond Hill that occurred in January.
In those incidents, as reported, as many as three gun-toting individuals — wearing black hooded sweatshirts and masks — swiped cash from the registers. After one of the robberies, they were observed fleeing inside a silver SUV with New York plates.
During the Feb. 25 robbery in College Point, police said, two masked suspects walked into the Dollar General store, confronted the three workers and displayed firearms. They forced the women into a rear bathroom and restrained them with cable ties.
Authorities said the gunmen forced a manager to open a safe, and upon doing so, they removed $1,000 in cash. The bandits also grabbed $2,500 in store merchandise, two electronic scanners, a landline phone and one of the victim’s cellphones.
Moments later, police noted, the crooks fled from the scene on foot westbound along 14th Road.
Officers from the 109th Precinct responded to a 911 call about the incident. None of the victims were injured.
Anyone with information about the College Point robbery or the south Queens heists is urged to call Crime Stoppers at 800-577-TIPS (for Spanish, dial 888-57-PISTA), visit their website or send a text message to 274637 (CRIMES), then enter TIP577. All calls and messages are kept confidential.
This story was updated on March 1 at 10:45 a.m.
