A Minnesota man was arrested Saturday night after he and another man allegedly accosted a woman near College Mall, attempted to rob her and intimidated her with a story of throat-slashing.
Allen Dyer, 26, of Minneapolis, is charged with robbery, a felony, and intimidation, a misdemeanor. Police responded at about 8:30 p.m. to College Mall, where they met with a woman, 20, who said she’d been sitting in her car in the parking lot when two men approached her, Bloomington Police Department Sgt. Pam Gladish said. One man went to the driver’s side of the car and began talking to her. He tried to persuade her to buy magazines from him.
When she told the men multiple times she didn’t have any money, she said, they told her that the last time a girl left that parking lot alone, she was followed home and her throat was slit. Eventually, she told them she’d go inside the mall to get cash from an ATM. She later told police she made up the plan as a way to escape.
The men followed her into the mall but not all the way to the ATM, Gladish said. The woman flagged down a security guard and pointed out the men. The men fled, but Dyer was apprehended soon after.
The victim described one suspect as a 6-foot-tall Indian man of about 30 years with a hat and jeans, and the other as a white man between the ages of 22 and 30 with a gray T-shirt and jeans. Gladish said the report did not specify which of the descriptions Dyer fit.
Dyer admitted to trying to sell magazines and following the woman into the mall but denied the throat-slashing anecdote. He was arrested and taken to Monroe County Correctional Center.
Jack Evans
