Two couples were robbed at gunpoint inside the same Fairfax County apartment complex in recent days, and police said yesterday they are investigating whether the holdups near the Vienna Metro station were committed by the same man.
The robberies occurred Saturday morning and Tuesday night in hallways of the Marquis at Vienna Station, a complex just off Nutley Street on the north side of the Metro station. One of the victims in Tuesday's robbery said that after the incident, he turned to find a note on his door from the apartment's management informing him of the first holdup.
The external doors to the apartment buildings are supposed to be locked, but many are not, said resident Lou Spirito, 40. He said that at 9:45 p.m. Tuesday, he and his wife were entering their building on Virginia Center Boulevard "and we were commenting how the lock didn't work. I forcefully shut the door behind me."
But simply closing the unlocked door did not keep their assailant from slipping in. "My wife saw the guy sneak up on me," Spirito said. "She screamed as he popped up behind me and put a gun to my head."
Spirito's wife ducked to the floor while the gunman twice demanded money, Spirito said. The robber then reached down and struggled to snatch a purse and book bag from Spirito's wife, took Spirito's wallet "and just bolted out the way he came in," said Spirito, a news artist at The Washington Post.
The couple were not hurt. Their description of the robber -- a black man, about 5 feet 5 inches tall, 20 to 30 years old -- was very similar to that of the robber in Saturday morning's incident.
In that case, Fairfax police said, a 22-year-old woman and 24-year-old man were in the hallway of their apartment building on Centerboro Drive about 2:30 a.m. A man approached them from behind, brandished a handgun and demanded the man's money and the woman's purse, police said.
Again, no one was physically hurt after the couple relinquished their wallets. And again, the robber was described as a black man, about 5 feet 6 inches tall, though no age estimate was available. The victims in that case could not be located.
The community manager of the Marquis at Vienna Station did not return a phone call yesterday seeking comment.
Officer Rich Henry, a Fairfax police spokesman, said robbery detectives "are investigating the possibility the [two robberies] are linked because of the suspect descriptions and the locations involved." Police did not have any suspects in custody.
Spirito said he and his wife were "still a little shaken, but pretty calm" after the brief confrontation. "It's more surreal than anything, and now we're more involved with trying to take care of our credit cards and driver's licenses."
