UNT students on alert after two overnight robberies

Police are looking for surveillance video of two overnight robberies on opposite ends of the University of North Texas campus.

The first happened about 12:30 a.m. Thursday and the second occurred about thirty minutes later. Both victims were male students.

"It's very disturbing and it's gonna make me nervous to come out in the night, " said student Michael Akwei.

The first robbery happened in the 1600 block of Hickory. A man was riding his bike when two men came up behind him and grabbed his cell phone. The two thieves ran to a red 4-door car, with a woman behind the wheel, waiting nearby and and took off.

Akwei lives on the same block as the robbery and said he was surprised to hear about the incident.

"It's very safe here,” Akwei said. “I've never heard about any robbery or assaults in this neighborhood.”

The second robbery happened Just before 1 a.m. near the intersection of West Eagle and Beatty.

A man was walking when two men came up from behind, hit him in the head, knocked him down, and stole his backpack and cell phone. A laptop was in the backpack. The two again ran to a red car, driven by a woman, got in and left.

"You think the area you live in is safe and then you see an alert where someone was robbed by three, you know three people involved, that's a lot, it was pretty scary,” said student Savannah Hubbard.

Hubbard, like other students, learned about the robberies from an email alert. Another incident happened in September and students were also alerted. The Sept. 6 aggravated robbery landed Ryan High School senior Javaris Steward behind bars.

"It just happened they just had a robbery you know back in September and so it's kind of scary it might happen again you just, you never know," Hubbard said.

Both UNT Police and Denton PD are looking for surveillance video from nearby businesses or homes that may have captured something from both early morning robberies.