By Matt Thacker

Graduate students Robert David Jaggie and Cary Cobb had a Halloween they’ll never forget. Jaggie awoke to the sound of breaking glass around 1:30 a.m. on Oct. 31.

“I heard glass breaking downstairs,” he said. “We have a lot of glass dishes, and so I thought my roommate [Cobb] might have broken a dish. So I went downstairs.”

When he got there, he quickly realized the man standing in his Burnett Avenue apartment wasn’t his roommate. Jaggie said the man, who he didn’t recognize, confronted him with a knife.

“He was looking for the previous owners of the house,” Jaggie said.

According to the police report, the suspect had entered the unlocked cellar area of the house and turned off the main circuit breakers before breaking through the glass door in the rear of the apartment.

Jaggie said the slightly drunk burglar grabbed him and led him upstairs. Once he realized the people he was looking for weren’t there, he demanded money, but Jaggie told him that he doesn’t keep any cash on him. The man then reportedly forced Jaggie to drive him to an ATM machine at Third Street and Cardinal Boulevard to withdraw money.

“I just kept thinking that bad things would happen if I didn’t give him what he wanted,” Jaggie said. “I kept trying to appease him and make him happy.”

The suspect then forced Jaggie to drive to the intersection of Second and Burnett Streets where he dropped off the robber. That was the last location anyone reportedly saw the man. Jaggie said the robber originally wanted him to drive to 18th Street, but afraid the robber would steal the car, Jaggie convinced him to get out at Second Street instead.

“I kind of had to twist his arm, but it wasn’t too bad,” he said.

He said the police don’t have any leads yet, but they believe the robber may have just been released from prison partially because the former owners he was looking for have been dead for more than two years.

The suspect is described as a white male in his late 40s to early 50s, between 5-foot-10 and 6-foot and about 180 pounds, and has a wandering left eye.

At the time, he was wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt, a University of Kentucky baseball cap and blue jeans. He is wanted for burglary, kidnapping, vandalism and robbery.

Maj. Kenneth Brown, assistant director of U of L’s Department of Public Safety, said he has worked at U of L for two years and doesn’t remember a break-in robbery near campus during his time at the university.

Brown said DPS will monitor the investigation, but Louisville Metro Police will lead the investigation.

Metro police declined to comment on the investigation, but Brown said there is no indication that this case is connected to any other recent robberies.

The ordeal has had a big impact on Jaggie’s life.

“It has affected me. … It makes me leery where I walk at night, when I used to never think about it,” he said.

He and his roommate plan to move farther away from campus to move to an area they consider safer.

 

Serial robber arrested

 

Metro police arrested Tyrus Lamont Harvey, 36, last Wednesday and charged him with 22 counts of robbery, including an incident at the Sav-a-Step Food Mart on Fourth Street Oct. 27.

Police arrested Harvey after he allegedly held up a Kinko’s on Bardstown Road. Brown is optimistic the arrest will help keep the area near campus safe.

“Any time you take a robber off the streets, it’s a safer place,” he said.

The lead detective was unavailable for comment.

The robberies extend back to late August. Police finally caught Harvey after a woman recognized his description and called police. Brown urges students to pay attention to their surroundings.

“If you see something, say something,” he said.