Gun-point Robbery in Fourth Street area of Berkeley
Last night at 8:37 pm, I was robbed at gun-point in the fourth street area of Berkeley, one of the main shopping/restaurant areas in Berkeley. This is not a singular incident. I have met several students of UC Berkeley, on campus and in my Amtrak ride, who have had similar fates. Some were even mobbed at gun-point in broad daylight. Some chose, wisely, to move out of Berkeley completely. Some were glad that they had nothing to do with Berkeley anymore. The deep hurt in all these friends, I did not empathize with completely, until yesterday night. Who would want to study in UC Berkeley, a premier university of the world, if this continues to happen? For sure, I won't encourage any one to ever study here nor my academia oriented friends to ever consider faculty positions here. This has to stop. Berkeley police has to get its act together and put a stop to this. Residents of Berkeley have to stop wasting police's time by not calling them to solve stupid pub brawls, etc., so they can focus on the more life threatening crimes.

The incident occurred while I was walking down fourth street in the direction of Gilman Street. I had just crossed Peet's coffee and then crossed Crate and Barrel 2 (CB2). A young african american man, medium built, 5'10'', rather well dressed in a jacket and baseball cap, asked me for a cigarette and then a dollar bill. I replied that I don't have either and then began walking diagonally to the other side of the street. My sixth sense made me dial 911 even when I was crossing the street. The next moment this man took out his gun and yelled at me to look back else he will shoot. Having realized that I had made a phone call, he made me drop my phone on the pavement. He kept saying, he won't hesitate to shoot if I didn't comply. At which point, he asked me to drop my wallet on the pavement and to back off, hands held in air. I began walking towards Peet's coffee and looked back to see him still pointing his gun at me. Then I ran towards Peet's coffee and borrowed a cell phone from some people on the street to call 911 again. But what about the first 911 call that I had already made from my phone? My phone was on the pavement while I emptying my pockets. For sure, the 911 handling center must have heard that call. Definitely the phone call from my phone must have been at least 60 seconds. In this age of GPS and LBS, shouldn't my first distress call been enough for cops to arrive? Instead, I had to run and ask around for 5 minutes to borrow a phone. By the time the cops arrived on scene, 10 minutes after the incident, the suspect was gone.

I wish I had kept Google Latitude, Skyfire or any other LBS tracking service turned on in my phone. Or that I had stronger encryption on my phone. Hopefully, we will have E911 localization on cell phones sooner than later, so cops can address a distress cell phone call without someone having to narrate to them where they are.

I hope anyone reading this learns something from what happened to me, to password protect their phone and use encryption. More than anything else, I hope Berkeley police gets its act together. It just keeps me wondering why are they not patrolling public transportation areas, bus stops, Amtrak stations, BART stations, etc., more frequently? Why does UC Berkeley not offer night shuttles from the campus to UC Village, where several families live?

May be no one will notice this article. May be some one does and may be this is a trickle that adds to a rising storm to get Berkeley police to act, or for UC Berkeley to sit up and take notice. May be you can help by forwarding this article to your friends or the media. Thanks.