Armed robbers steal $72K in jewelry outside Diamond District store: cops
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Police respond to the scene where three people were robbed of about $72,000 in jewelry and watches as they left a Diamond District store. William C. Lopez/NYPOST
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A pair of gun-toting crooks robbed three Diamond District customers of $72,000 in pricey jewelry — with one of the victims describing the harrowing heist to The Post on Tuesday.
"It was quick," said robbery victim Marie Rivera. "I think they already knew we were going to come out. When we opened the door, they came up to us right away."
The victims were walking out of Avis Diamond at 71 W. 47th St. near Fifth Avenue around 7:50 p.m. Monday when the two male suspects rushed at the trio, flashed guns and demanded their belongings, Rivera and cops said.
"They opened the door and took my purse," Rivera said. "I had two necklaces in my purse, which were diamond necklaces.
"They got a necklace from my friend as well, which also had diamonds."
She said she had just picked up her necklaces after they had been cleaned and that her friend got back a watch that had been repaired before they were robbed.
Surveillance video shows the thieves leaving the store with at least one large bag and jumping into a white Jeep SUV outside before speeding off.
No arrests have been made.
The victims were leaving the Diamond District store when two men held them up at gunpoint.
William C. Lopez/NYPOST
"This is the third [local] robbery in the past two weeks that I know of," a ticked-off Diamond District jeweler told The Post on Tuesday. "This is the worst crime has been on 47th Street in the past 20 years. Forty-seventh Street used to be one of the safest streets. Now all the dealers are talking about how we've become targets."
"We're not getting enough help from police," he said. "A lot of these guys wait for shoppers to go into offices ore stores and get them at their cars or follow them all the way home.
"The mayor has to do something about it," he added. "What are we paying taxes for? To get robbed? To get f—ed twice?"
The jeweler's claim of repeat recent local heists could not be immdiately confirmed with cops.
In April, a thief swiped a stash of diamond rings worth nearly half a million dollars from another Diamond District retailer.
The shopkeeper at the Diamond Center of USA had stepped into the back room before the woman snatched 112 of the costly baubles, police said.
One of the Big Apple's biggest jewelry heists occurred in August 2019, when two armed crooks robbed Avianne & Co., Jewelers and made off with a whopping $4 million in shiny goods.
The suspects jumped into a waiting car and fled, but two of them were later arrested.
Pedro Davila, 30, was picked up in Florida several months later, while the other, Jaysean Sutton, was arrested and pleaded guilty in federal court in January and is awaiting sentencing.
Sutton, 43, is currently being held at the federal detention center in Brooklyn, records show. The case against Davila is also pending.
Additional reporting by Tina Moore and Joe Marino
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