Police are exploring a possible connection between an attempted robbery near the University of Minnesota's campus last week and two recent armed stickups in Eden Prairie.
A search warrant affidavit filed in Hennepin County District Court last week doesn't identify the suspects or detail why investigators believe the incidents are connected, although each incident apparently involved a gray sedan.
In the first incident, about 10:20 a.m. Dec. 4, a man was playing video games alone at his house in the area of Golf View Drive and Vale Court when police say two men in black hoodies broke into the house and tried to force their way into his room. Police say one of the attackers held a handgun up to the man's face, but the victim managed to slam his bedroom door shut before they could get inside, where he called 911.
The victim believes the suspects may have fired one shot inside the house, police said.
Three days later, a woman said she was robbed of her keys at gunpoint while parking her car at her apartment off Valley View Road. The male suspects — two of whom were wearing "full facemasks," while the other had on a gray hoodie with the hood pulled tightly over his face — fled the area in a gray car, possibly a Honda, the woman later told police.
The affidavit draws a connection to another "similar incident" that happened near the U campus on Dec. 8.
Campus police said in a safety alert sent out that day that the robbery attempt happened about 12:45 a.m. in the area of Delaware and Harvard streets and involved three male suspects wearing facemasks. At least one of the men brandished a handgun. According to the affidavit, the suspects hopped out of a gray sedan and approached the victim, demanding his belongings. The victim handed over his keys and a ChapStick tube, but then, "out of fear," he grabbed the items back and ran north on Harvard, the affidavit said.
No arrests had been announced as of Monday morning.
