Graduate student Max Kardon was robbed at knifepoint early Friday morning as he tried to stop a man from assaulting a female undergraduate at the intersection of Packard Avenue and Powderhouse Boulevard.
The Tufts University Police Department (TUPD) has attained footage of a suspect using Kardon's credit card at a CVS Pharmacy and a Dunkin' Donuts shortly after it was stolen.
Kardon and Ahmed Humayun, who are students at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, were walking home from a friend's house at about 1 a.m. when they saw a man approach a young woman who had been walking home alone. He was holding a knife.
"At first it looked like they knew each other, but then we heard her start screaming, 'Let go, don't touch me, get away from me,'" Kardon said. "We went up and said, 'Is everything okay?' ... I was worried that he was going to try to sexually assault her."
After Kardon and Humayun approached the assailant, he turned away from the female and attacked Kardon. He threatened Kardon and demanded money.
"As soon as we got there he let go of her, and he grabbed me by the throat and started choking me a little bit," Kardon said. The attacker "held a knife up, and he said, 'Give me all your money or I'm going to f-king stab you.'"
Kardon said that he was frightened for his life.
"What I felt was just, 'Oh man, if this guy stabs me in the throat, I'm gonna die,'" he said. "I was just thinking that I would be happy to give him anything that he asked for so long as he didn't stab me. The visceral experience was just, like, so chaotic. He was shaking me ... all I could see were his angry eyes."
Kardon immediately gave his wallet to the assaulter, then turned and ran as quickly as he could down Packard Avenue. While the robber had been accosting Kardon, Humayun and the female student had also run away.
Kardon stopped running after about 100 yards. He started dialing the Somerville Police on his cell phone and turned around to see a red Ford Taurus pull up and pick up the assailant.
"Somebody else was driving the Ford Taurus. They pulled up and picked him up and then drove away," Kardon said.
The Somerville Police arrived, took the students' report and performed a search of the area, but they did not find the robber.
Then Kardon and Humayun took the female undergraduate, who requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of the situation, to her house.
She said that she was frightened and surprised when she was accosted.
"It was scary," she said. "I've done that walk a million times ... I just don't feel safe anymore. You'd think you're safe here and I did think I'm safe here ... It just shakes you."
Later that day, Kardon went to the TUPD station and filed a report. An officer there asked Kardon to call his credit company and get a list of charges that had been declined since he canceled the card, which he did soon after the robbery.
The list indicated that the credit card had been used at a Dunkin' Donuts, two gas stations and a CVS.
At the Dunkin' Donuts and the CVS store, surveillance cameras had caught footage of a man with a female accomplice.In one, his face is vividly depicted.
"I don't know who the girl is, but they both were trying to use my credit card," Kardn said. "So there should be a wanted poster going up around campus pretty soon with a pretty clear picture of his face. You can see him perfectly."
Any information on the case can be reported to TUPD at 617-627-3030.
