University Police made two more arrests in connection with a Sept. 6 Fraternity Row robbery early yesterday morning.
Police arrested Freeman Obeng Kwarteng, 20, and Emannuel Scott, 20, of Silver Spring, and charged the pair with robbery. Kwarteng faces further charges of second-degree assault, one count of theft and four counts related to fraudulent credit card expenditures.
The arrests come more than two weeks after the arrest of Anthony Wayne Crowe and almost two months after the initial suspect, Najie Shabay Walker, was charged. University Police spokesman Paul Dillon said there are no pending arrests in the case.
Charging documents for Crowe obtained from court records provide a clearer set of events on the night of the robbery.
Kwarteng, Scott, Walker, Crowe and another male friend came to attend parties in College Park together, riding in a white Chevy Impala. After being denied entry at a Stamp Student Union party and going to another party at a University Courtyards apartment later broken up by University Police, they parked along Fraternity Row about 2:45 a.m.
It was at this time a student victim walking in the field in the middle of Fraternity Row was approached by two men. The first man, who the victim identified as Crowe, pushed the victim to the ground, while the second suspect came at him from behind. The victim then said Crowe took his wallet and told him to stay down. The two men fled the scene.
Initially, Kwarteng and Scott told police that Walker and Crowe left the car, returned minutes later and told them to go to a Hyattsville 7-Eleven. They claimed no knowledge of the robbery at the time.
Only 10 minutes after the mugging, Crowe and Walker used a stolen credit card in Hyattsville to buy phone cards, a Visa gift card and cigarettes, among other purchases, totaling just less than $95. Within the hour, they also made purchases totaling more than $50 at another 7-Eleven in Silver Spring.
Police obtained store security footage of the two men and the car and used the footage to corroborate the men's identities with other witnesses. After the victim positively identified Crowe as the suspect who brought him down in the Fraternity Row field, they arrested him on Nov. 17. Walker remains in jail for concealed weapon charges in Montgomery County.
On Dec. 1, investigating officer Det. Raphael Moss filed warrants for Kwarteng and Scott. They were served about 5 a.m. yesterday without incident at the men's respective homes.
Dillon was unable to specify any particular evidence incriminating Kwarteng and Scott but said police learned from the fifth person in the car that the other two men initially downplayed their role in the robbery. The fifth person has not been charged.
Crowe's charging documents reveal several miscues by the suspects, particularly Walker. When Moss interviewed Walker at the Montgomery County police office in Silver Spring, Walker was wearing the same shirt he was wearing in video footage from the night of the robbery. He also claimed to know nothing about a robbery "in a field" before Moss said where the incident in question had taken place.
Dillon credited Moss for closing the case and said the arrests will help keep crime low and hopefully discourage future incidents.
"Detective Moss spent a lot of hours on this investigation and did a great job," he said. "When you arrest the guys committing crimes, you can reduce the crime rate."
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