COLUMBUS – Police are asking for help locating the suspects in a violent home-invasion attack on an elderly East Side man last week.
2ND UPDATE 9/1/19:
Elderly victim recovering after surgery to repair injuries inflicted by the suspects during the home invasion.
Note: Newly obtained images of the suspects, walking in the area, prior to the robbery.
Info-CPD: 614-645-4665 or pthomas@columbuspolice.org. https://t.co/Tgzw5ZOXor pic.twitter.com/anxzOSypKq
— Columbus Division of Police (@ColumbusPolice) September 2, 2019
Detectives with the Robbery Unit say, when the 71-year-old man answered the door at his Basil Drive home at 2:45 p.m. on August 25, he was met by two teenagers who asked if he needed his grass cut, Det. Phillip Thomas said.
He declined but the suspects returned and asked to use the man’s phone. Thomas says the man declined again and the pair forced their way inside, knocking the man to the ground and beating him. The man, whose name was not released, suffered lacerations to his face and had a tooth knocked out, Thomas said.
After being incapacitated for almost two hours, Thomas says the injured man was able to get to his phone and call 911.
The suspects fled in the victim’s 2007 Honda CRV, which was found abandoned later in the 800 block of Parsons Avenue.
A third man was seen driving the stolen car before it was recovered and he appeared to leave the area on foot in the company of two other males (pictured, above), Thomas said.
The Robbery Unit is looking for information in this case and is hoping that someone may have seen the suspects in the area or have seen the vehicle after it was stolen.
Information can be provided to authorities by calling the CPD Robbery Unit at 614-645-4665 or through Central Ohio Crime Stoppers at 614-461-8477 (TIPS).