Two armed kids mugged another just off the International High School campus on December 20. Principal Carmelita Reyes reported on a Temescal neighborhood listserv: “One of my 9th grade immigrant students, a boy from the Congo, was walking along 45th Street … when he was mugged by two older Asian teens … at about 3:40 pm when there were plenty of people on the street. He was grabbed from behind and thrown against the fence then the attacker shoved a knife up against his side. The other attacker then pulled a gun on my student. He gave up all his valuables – wallet, iPod, and earring – without an argument.”
Just that morning, Reyes had met Oakland Tech’s principal, who told her “that one of her students and a custodian had been mugged at gunpoint this week. I am very worried about the crime problem,” Reyes writes. “There is no reason students should be held up at gunpoint at 3:40 in the afternoon.”