Heightened police presence in response to a string of robberies in the East Village/Gramercy Park area likely caused Kenneth Nottage, 46, to flee the neighborhood and head north, where he was apprehended April 10, said Deputy Inspector Peter J. Venice at a community meeting of the 9th Precinct Tuesday.
According to police, the brazen robber struck at all times of day between April 2 and 7, targeting six different laundromats and bodegas and even hitting one First Avenue grocery store twice. An NYPD spokesperson told us Nottage was unarmed throughout the crime spree but would simulate holding a gun or knife hidden under fabric in order to coerce clerks into giving him cash from the register. In the five-day period when he was targeting businesses near Stuyvesant Town and in the East Village he managed to steal $2,766.
Nottage, who is listed by the police as homeless, allegedly committed several additional burglaries before he was arrested on the street at the corner of 112th West Street and Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard after being recognized by police. Surveillance cameras caught him in action in the video below.
769-15 MTN ROB SQD from Bedford + Bowery on Vimeo.