CBS2 Exclusive: L.I. Woman Speaks After Being Robbed By Gun-Toting Fake Repairmen
WEST HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) -- Repairmen responding a recent call from a Long Island home turned out to be fake, and soon, the homeowner was surrounded by three gun-toting robbers.
As CBS2's Jennifer McLogan reported exclusively, the West Hempstead homeowner was in tears on Wednesday – five days after the robbery.
"They just – I just had three men in my house, and one held me with a gun," she said. "And now, I'm not trusting anyone to come."
Nassau County police detectives said the woman saved herself and her neighbors by doing the right thing when the fake repairmen entered her home and displayed a firearm.
One of the robbers was masked. The other two – one white, the other black – were depicted in a sketch.
They demanded cash and jewels, police said.
The victim, a Long Island schoolteacher, complied and remained calm. She immediately called 911 and was able to recount specific details of the horror responding to Nassau County police officers, who arrived moments later.
The criminals escaped down Wildwood Road and onto the nearby Southern State Parkway with the valuables, police said.
"Thank God nobody was hurt," said Nassau County police Detective Lt. Richard Lebrun. They did flee, we believe, in a bluish-grayish type Chevy sedan -- late model, southbound on Wildwood Road in West Hempstead.
Police said the homeowner and her family needed their garage door fixed and had called local repairmen, and they were expecting help. The woman willingly answered the door, and at the time, she saw numerous contractors doing work up and down the street and felt safe.
But now, she said she would get all of their IDs first – and even that may not be enough.
"How do I know it's a real ID?" she said. "I mean, anybody can make up an ID, right?"
The victim fears it was an inside job, and now police are investigating the garage door company that the homeowner called just before the robbers appeared.
Robberies in the neighborhood are highly unusual, and police said because of the help of the victim, they hope to find the perpetrators.
