PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Police are looking for a group of men who kidnapped a man at gunpoint outside his Tacony home and held him for ransom.
Investigators say it was around 1 a.m. Friday when a car pulled up to the man as he was arriving home near Ditman Street and Unruh Avenue. A person then jumped out of a dark-colored SUV and put a bag over the man’s head before forcing him inside the car.
According to Deputy Police Commissioner Frank Vanore, he was asked to give up his house keys and other information he had, like his ID.
Police say they then went to his home and assaulted two people inside — a 52-year-old and 27-year-old.
They showed the man’s ID they had stolen, demanded a “specific safe with specific jewelry,” and thousands of dollars in exchange for his release.
Vanore says the jewelry was provided and the suspects fled the scene in the SUV, “releasing the people they had captured.”
Police say four of the suspects have thin builds and one is heavyset. They say they were all dressed in black, wearing ski masks, and are between 5-foot-9 and 6 feet tall.
Vanore says he believes this may have been a targeted incident, but they need to investigate more.
Another home in the northeast is connected to the investigation but police have not said how.