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Bread Furst employee knocked unconscious in robbery in Northwest | Bread Furst employee knocked unconscious in robbery in Northwest |
(about 11 hours later) | |
An employee of an upscale bakery in upper Northwest Washington was knocked unconscious briefly after he was unable to open a safe during an attempted armed robbery Tuesday, according to a D.C. police report. | |
The 29-year-old, who works at Bread Furst on Connecticut Avenue near the Van Ness Metro station, suffered an abrasion to his left cheek when he was beaten on the head with a gun, the report says. He received several stitches at a hospital. | |
New details in the report indicate the severity of the attack, which occurred about 12:30 p.m. The shop opened in 2014 in the 4400 block of Connecticut Avenue by award-winning chef and master baker Mark Furstenberg, a longtime fixture of the District’s culinary scene. | |
“It’s very unfortunate,” Furstenberg said when reached by phone at a conference in California. | “It’s very unfortunate,” Furstenberg said when reached by phone at a conference in California. |
[Bakery robbed in Upper Northwest Washington] | [Bakery robbed in Upper Northwest Washington] |
Robberies are up in the District this year — from 149 during the first 19 days of 2014 to 198 so far this year. Two armed robberies have occurred in the police patrol area that includes the bakery, one just south of the Van Ness Metro and the other north of it. | |
One neighborhood particularly hard hit has been Takoma, about four miles from Van Ness on the other side of Rock Creek Park. Police say that at least six street robberies or attempted robberies have occurred there in the past week. | |
[Takoma neighborhood hard hit by robberies this year] | [Takoma neighborhood hard hit by robberies this year] |
The police report says two men — one with a gun — entered the bakery through a back alley door and went to the upstairs office. The man with the gun told an employee, “Ya’all know who the f--- this is, give me the money,” the report says. | |
Police said the armed man then jumped on the employee’s back, forced him to the floor and demanded that he open the safe. After the worker failed to do so, the report says, the gunman struck him “several times on the side of the head with the weapon.” | |
Both men then ran out of the shop through the back door and down the alley. Police have not put out a description of either person. | |
A manager of the shop said Tuesday that no customers were inside when the robbery occurred. But one woman contacted The Washington Post on Tuesday night and said that she was in line with two other people and that there were 10 customers sitting at tables at the time. She said she and others didn’t see the robbery or the suspects enter. | |
A friend of the woman’s said the two met at the shop a few minutes before 12:30 p.m. and walked in through the same alley door that police said the robbers used. Both women asked for anonymity because no arrests have been made in the case. | |
The second woman said they got in line to order when she heard an employee tell another to “lock the front door.” Then she said, another worker announced: “We have just been robbed. I called the police. You’re probably going to have to leave.” | |
[Bread Furst receives rave reviews] | [Bread Furst receives rave reviews] |
But the woman said that the customers did not leave and that she and her friend ordered food and sat down at a table. She then saw uniformed police officers, and another employee “ushered us out the front door.” | |
She said that police did not take statements from people in the shop and that she and her friend went home to finish their meals. | |
Tim Carman contributed to this report. | Tim Carman contributed to this report. |