Attempted robbery on Macon between Tompkins & Throop, July 20
Posting now in case it helps someone—a pretty strange and traumatizing event happened to me on July 20 around 4:00 PM.
Please don’t criticize me for what I did/didn’t do; I’ve gotten flack from a surprising number of people because I am of the opinion that the cops don’t/won’t do anything in these situations (based on dealings with them prior to 7/20).
7/20 was a beautiful, sunny day, the first reasonably cool one in over a week. I was walking home from work, when, at 234 Macon Street (between Tompkins and Throop—the address is memorable bc there’s a tree with white paint on its trunk), two teenage boys came up to me and demanded I give them my things. They called me several expletives and told me to hand over “everything I had,” to which I replied with various iterations of “no” and “stop”.
I kept stalling (“Why are you doing this? Leave me alone”) hoping they’d just give up, but the tension rose and I noticed the taller boy was holding a knife at his side and getting closer to me. I tried to get into the street by skirting between two parked cars but the boys cornered me, one on the street side and one on the sidewalk. The taller one kept shushing me, saying “Be quiet or I’ll fucking stab you.”
At that point, I obviously became afraid and started telling them to stop a bit more loudly; fortunately, some men who were working on a home renovation on the other side of the street street about ~15 feet away noticed something was wrong and started yelling at the boys. I managed to start crossing the street toward the men and the boys fled toward Tompkins.
I was really shaken up and some neighbors began to come out of their houses to see what was going on. A kind woman gave me a chair in the shade and offered me some water, as did the workers. I declined to call the police or otherwise file a report at the time, as all I wanted to do was get home.
I tend to approach situations like this one from an anticarceral perspective—but this was an odd one since I, in theory, could have easily been harmed. The boys were both Black and I am white. They looked to be under eighteen years old and may have been as young as fourteen or fifteen. The shorter one claimed to have a gun but I doubted he did. The taller one definitely had a knife but I wasn’t certain he’d use it; ultimately, I just wanted them to realize they were making a very bad choice and leave before anyone got hurt.
They were wearing nondescript clothes (knee-length, mesh shorts, tank tops, probably sneakers but I wasn’t looking at their feet) and the taller one was wearing a blue surgical mask, so I couldn’t see the bottom half of his face. His hair was in short braids. The smaller boy had a short haircut IIRC. Both were thin and not particular muscular.
In sum, I can only hope they never try this BS again and that y’all stay safe out there! The workers are heroes and I’ll be forever grateful they stepped in when they did. I’ve lived in NYC for 11 years and this is the first time something like this has ever happened to me so I guess I’m doing alright. Watch out for your neighbors—I know I’ll be paying closer attention when walking alone going forward.