A 28-year-old man was carrying an enormous amount of cash and wearing a pricey Rolex watch near the Queens Center Mall during the early morning hours of Sunday, Dec. 29, when he made a couple of errors in judgment that nearly cost him his life.
First, he entered a black SUV with tinted windows with two unidentified men near Woodhaven Boulevard and Queens Boulevard at around 2:30 a.m.
Once inside the vehicle, the perpetrators began to beat him and forcibly removed his watch and cell phone. When the thugs grabbed his cash, he made his second mistake. He fought back and tried to retrieve his property, police said Thursday. That’s when one of his assailants kicked him in the face repeatedly and then shoved him out of the vehicle and accelerated, dragging the victim along the roadway in front of the Queens Center Mall.
The victim eventually became dislodged from the vehicle and sustained serious physical injuries. The robbers sped away from the scene in the black GMC Yukon with tinted windows in an unknown direction and remain at large. Police from the 110th Precinct in Elmhurst responded to the location and found the injured man lying on the street. EMS rushed him to Elmhurst Hospital, where he was listed in stable condition.
The stolen property included $81,000 in cash, a $16,000 Rolex watch, and his cell phone, which was valued at $900, according to a law enforcement source familiar with the investigation.
The NYPD released surveillance images of the suspects and the Black GM Yukon on Thursday, describing them as having dark complexions and thin builds. One wore a black hooded sweatshirt, light-colored blue jeans, and dark sneakers. The other suspect was wearing sunglasses in the darkness and had a beard and mustache. He also wore a black hooded sweatshirt, black pants, and black sneakers.
Anyone with information regarding this violent heist 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 Crime Stoppers website at crimestoppers.nypdonline.org or on X (the platform formerly known as Twitter) @NYPDTips. All calls and messages are confidential.
Through Jan. 5, the 110th Precinct has reported five robberies so far in 2025, the same number reported at the same point last year. The precinct has reported 14 felony assaults so far this year, three fewer than the 17 reported at the same point in 2024, according to the most recent CompStat report.
