VIDEO: Suspects Sought In Violent Robbery In Bronx Building Lobby
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A Bronx man was recovering Sunday after he was suddenly attacked, beaten and robbed.
As CBS2's Dave Carlin reported, the victim was visiting his daughter and grandchildren when he was attacked in the lobby of a building on Morris Avenue in Fordham Heights on April 4. Investigators released surveillance video of the alleged robbery on Sunday.
"My dad is a family man," said the man's daughter, who did not want to be identified. "He has six kids, three grandkids, and usually lives his life through us."
In surveillance video, the pair can be seen on the sidewalk out front.
They got inside the first door, and then the victim allowed them to tailgate in to the lobby right behind him.
Soon afterward, the men threw the victim to the floor, punching and kicking him, and then one suspect grabbed his bag and they ran out of the building.
The man and his daughter asked that his face not be shown in full. With the suspects on the loose, the family feared retaliation.
"No idea who they were," the victim's daughter said. "He's never seen them before."
The woman said the robbers got her father's gym bag, as well as $40 in his wallet.
CBS2 showed the brutal video to some of the daughter's Fordham Heights neighbors.
"It does make me sick," one woman said.
"You know, you got people doing petty stuff like that for no reason," added Johnny Brito of Fordham Heights.
On the same morning, the victim had been at his gym on Grand Concourse, and investigators will try to figure out if the men followed him to the building from the facility.
The daughter said her father was surprised the two men did not take his cellphone, which he used right away.
The father called the daughter and told her to come downstairs to the building superintendent's basement apartment. She said when she got down to the basement, she was surprised to see how bloody and bruised he was.
"It's very unfortunate, especially living around here," she said. "You feel like in your neighborhood, you're never safe."
The victim was treated and released from St. Barnabas Hospital with injuries to his face.
The first suspect is described as an approximately 25-year-old Hispanic male, roughly 5'10" and 190 pounds with a dark complexion and black hair and a beard. He was last seen wearing a black Mercedes Benz baseball cap, a black hooded sweatshirt, and black sweatpants.
The second suspect is described as an approximately 25-year-old Hispanic male, roughly 5'10" and 180 pounds with a light complexion and close cut hair. He was last seen wearing a black hooded sweatshirt and black sweatpants.
Anyone with information was asked to call the NYPD Crime Stoppers at (800) 577-TIPS or (888) 57-PISTA for Spanish, log onto the Crime Stoppers website, or text tips to 274637 (CRIMES) and enter TIP577.