NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ—The New Brunswick Police Department (NBPD) is investigating a series of robberies, including at least two that took place Monday night into Tuesday morning on opposite sides of the city.

One incident that police said fit a pattern took place on Central Avenue and involved a shotgun.  According to emergency radio transmissions, an ambulance was dispatched to aid one of the victims.

“Be advised, this is the third call in like three days, same description, same area,” said one officer over the police radio.

Just seven hours earlier, a home on Jones Avenue was burglarized in another armed home invasion.  In both cases, the victims were Rutgers University students.

Because of that, and the fact they occurred in near the campus from Rutgers, crime alerts were issued to the university community and subscribers to its free public Nixle account.

For the first time in recent memory, the two incidents were combined in one alert.  The incidents were the twenty-first and twenty-second to generate crime alerts since September.  Most of those incidents occurred in the city’s Fifth and Sixth Wards.

But the first reported incident on this night took place in the Second Ward, at 35 Jones Avenue, near intersection with Townsend Street.

One of the victims reported that three male perpetrators entered his unsecured residence and displayed a firearm while demanding narcotics.

Prior to leaving the residence, the perpetrators removed several items of value and a small quantity of narcotics.

Police said that one of the three males wore a grey hoodie and the other male been seen wearing a red hoodie as well.  There was no description for the third male, who  has not been identified yet.

According to police radio communications, witnesses said the three suspects drove-off in a dark blue Nissan Maxima with Maryland license plates.

Though the crime alert erroneously says it occurred first, what was actually the second of the two robberies occurred on Tuesday December 30 at approximately 1:05 a.m. in a residence at 16 Central Avenue, near Prosper Street.

That area was the site where an attempted armed robbery took place last week, as we reported.

In both the Jones Avenue and Central Avenue incidents, the victims reported that three unidentified male perpetrators entered their unlocked homes.

According to police radio transmissions, one of the three males had a shotgun in the Central Avenue incident and demanded the victim to hand over items of value.

One of the three males then proceeded to assault one of the victims, who sustained non-life threatening injuries, before all three fled on foot.

The NBPD said that there were narcotics present at that scene as well, and indicated it was robbed for the second time this month

“Just be advised, this is the second time this has happened at this residence,” said a dispatcher, indicating there was a prior incident on December 3.

The New Brunswick Police Department asks that anyone with information on either crime, or anyone who may have been in either area at the time, contact the NBPD Detective Bureau at 732-745-5217.

Reporter at New Brunswick Today