dpEAST CLEVELAND, Ohio (WOIO) – A 78-year-old woman was carjacked at a gas station on Superior Avenue while pumping gas, and her family says a police report was not filed until hours after the incident.
The carjacking happened on a Monday morning at approximately 11 a.m. at the Express Gas Station on Superior Avenue in East Cleveland. The woman, who did not want to show her face on camera or share her name, said she was placing a gas can in the back of her car when the suspect approached.
“When I went to put my gas can in the back of my car, that’s when he jumped me,” she said.
Car, belongings and football equipment taken
The suspect drove off in what the family described as her only working car. Her personal belongings, house keys and her great-grandson’s brand new football equipment were also inside the vehicle. A gas station clerk drove the woman home after the incident.
Her granddaughter, Bria Favors, said seeing her grandmother’s reaction was something she will not forget.
“The look on her face — to me, she looked like a little girl, like a frightened little girl,” Favors said.
Report not filed for hours, family says
The grandmother said she believed a police report had been filed after speaking with officers at the scene.
“He gave me his number and his name and said he would report it. I thought they were looking for it. He said, ‘I’m going to look for your car,’ and I took his word for it,” she said.
Favors tracked her grandmother’s car using her phone to a location in Cleveland and called 911. That is when the family learned a report had not yet been filed.
“They went to go look at the location that I told them, but they did not find it, and there was no report in the system at the time of her car being stolen,” Favors said.
The family then went to the East Cleveland Police Station, where they said they were told a report was not filed until eight hours after the carjacking.
19 News reached out to East Cleveland police and the city to ask about the delay in filing the report and for any updates on the investigation. Neither had responded as of publication.
“I feel lucky that I’m still here,” the grandmother said.
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