Minneapolis robber arrested

WCCO TV website reports the arrest of what appears to be another Somali robber, Ebrahim Mohamud Mohammed:

(WCCO) Minneapolis A 21-year-old St. Paul man is accused of using a fake gun to rob four women in Minneapolis last month, court papers said.

Ebrahim Mohamud Mohammed was charged Friday with four counts of aggravated first-degree robbery after admitting his involvement to police, according to a criminal complaint.

Mohammed has been charged in connection with a Jan. 11 incident in South Minneapolis; a Jan. 20 incident on 44th Avenue South; a Jan. 23 incident on 40th Avenue South; and a Jan. 31 incident on 45th Avenue South, court papers said.

In each instance, victims told police they were getting out of their cars outside their homes when two men would approach and demand the women's purses or bags at gunpoint.

There is no word on the status of the accomplice, although we can assume he is not in custody. Yet.

While the national origin of the robber is not reported, it's a good chance he is Somali. This would fit a troubling pattern of (apparent) Somali robbers using armed violence in their crimes, which have been mostly against individuals. The first indication of Somali robbers goes back to the beginning of the first Minneapolis Uprising of 2005, which developed over late spring. Here's one of the earliest posts on this blog (5/3/05) that described robbery suspects: "The Uptown crime wave and the PC trifecta".

This post from 8/11/05 describes the suspects in the 2nd Minneapolis Uprising from a Fox 9 News report as "Somali males": "Can't be true - the Uptown robbers are back".

An Edina TCF Bank was robbed 1/6/06 by a black male with an "East African accent".

This is in no way meant to denigrate all Somalis, as many are good taxpaying citizens. It's even possible that the similar backgrounds of these robbers are an unfortunate coincidence. Whatever the case might be, one can't ignore a disturbing trend of common characteristics.

This bears watching.