From a story by Paul Duggan in today’s Washington Post:
A man creeps into a woman’s bedroom in a dorm or student apartment, usually through an unlocked door or window and almost always while the victim is asleep. He slides into bed beside her, or he climbs on top of her. Then he gropes her. Or worse. And when she bolts awake, screaming, the intruder leaps to his feet and runs, vanishing in the darkness.
The modus operandi sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Similar crimes have happened at least 13 times at this university. But the crime being discussed didn’t happen in College Park, but rather near Georgetown University.
The Georgetown Voice’s Vox Populi blog has done a great job of tracking this story. While the Post focuses exclusively on Georgetown, attacks have also apparently occurred near George Washington and American universities.
But this is where things get interesting. The attacks don’t appear to be the work of one ‘Cuddler,’ because the descriptions of the attackers at Georgetown don’t match up with one another. In the Post’s story, D.C. Police Cmdr. Rodney Parks lists off the descriptions:
“White male, 20 to 30 years old, 5-8 or 5-9, short dark hair, thin build, low voice. . . . White male, 6-2, 200 pounds, chubby, scruffy beard. . . . Hispanic male, 25, 5-10 to 6 feet, thin, olive complexion, cleanshaven. . . . Tall male, black, early 20s, medium build . . . White male, 25, muscular build, athletic, spiked hair standing straight up. . .
“Here’s one for you: Unknown Middle Eastern male.”
For comparison purposes, the College Park cuddler has been described somewhat consistently as a white male in his 20s. So, in the end, it’s difficult to say these attacks are the work of one person or even share anything more than a creepy nickname for their perpetrators.
Regardless of the number of assailants, police everywhere seem determined to catch them. From a NBC Washington story on the latest attacks in Georgetown:
“We’re going to catch him,” said Rocco DelMonaco, Georgetown University’s security chief. “Sooner or later we are going to make sure that we get to the bottom of this.”
Let’s hope so.
when I read that Post story, I couldn’t believe they didn’t mention the College Park cuddler. didn’t know about the incidents at GW and American, though.