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FORT WORTH — The elderly man and woman, practically neighbors in east Fort Worth, have never met, but they awoke Tuesday to the same nightmare.
The woman, 72, is a widow. The man, 85, is divorced and mostly deaf.Within two hours early Tuesday morning, three men broke into their homes, terrorized them, ransacked the rooms and stole their belongings, police reported.The elderly man was severely beaten and was hospitalized in intensive care Tuesday afternoon."They beat him until he was down on the floor," said his niece, Pam Fojtik. "He had defensive wounds on his hands where he was trying to keep them from hitting his face. He was begging them to stop."The woman was not injured, but among the items stolen was the wedding ring set from her hand, she said.Within hours, police had arrested three suspects who they believe are also responsible for the robberies of two nearby convenience stores — a 7-Eleven at 2536 E. Lancaster Ave. and a Fina at 4225 Miller Ave. — shortly before 5 a.m.An employee of one of the stores spotted the suspects driving by while police were still on the scene investigating, said Sgt. Pedro Criado, a police spokesman.Officers pulled the car over and found evidence linking the three occupants to all four robberies, he said.Bryant Soriano, 17, and Jose Ignacio Razo, 18, were being booked into the Mansfield Jail on Tuesday evening, each facing charges in four aggravated robbery cases, a jail spokesman said. Bail was set at $100,000 on each charge, the spokesman said.A 16-year-old, who was not identified because of his age, was turned over to juvenile authorities.'Just give us your money’The robberies began about 12:20 a.m. when the woman awoke to a loud noise inside her home in the 5100 block of South Hampshire Boulevard, she said in an interview. She asked that her name not be used. "One of them appeared in the doorway to my bedroom with a gun," she said. "They had their faces disguised. Their T-shirts pulled over their chins and some kind of mask over their eyes."They said: 'We won’t hurt you. Just give us your money.’ "For the next 15 minutes, the woman said, the intruders searched her home. They stole her purse, which held about $50, but dropped her wallet, which contained her identification, she said. The woman, whose husband of 50 years died seven years ago, said the men even demanded that she pull her wedding ring set from her finger."They didn’t harm me in any way," the woman said. "I had my dog in my house. He’s a pit bull. I was so afraid he was going to snap at them or bite at one of them and then they would shoot at me."The woman, who was injured in 2002 in a mugging outside an east Fort Worth grocery store, said she never imagined that she would be attacked inside her home. "Looking up and seeing that guy with a gun — it was horrifying," she said. "I’m afraid I’m going to be scared at night here. I’ll never feel safe again."
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