Ceres Police are hoping the public can lead them to the man who stole a woman’s cell phone during a Monday morning set-up where he posed as a buyer. As the owner tried to retrieve the phone through the car window, the thief accelerated away from the scene, resulting in her injuries.

The incident occurred at 10:30 a.m. at the Rite Aid parking lot on Mitchell Road. The victim reported the crime at the next-door Ceres Fire Station. The victim told police she had arranged to sell her cell phone using the “Offer Up” app.  She had arranged to meet a female named “Sarah” who would be arriving in a gray Cadillac. Intending to show the phone to the buyer, she walked up to a similar vehicle and noticed a man in the driver seat. He told the woman that the phone was for his girlfriend and asked to see it. As he sat in the car she showed the phone to him through the open window. He grabbed it and began to accelerate off with the victim starting to fall and grabbing onto the window of the car door. She was dragged a short distance before falling off, sustaining scrapes and lacerations on her stomach and side requiring treatment at a local hospital. 

Police would like to find and arrest the man who was described as a Hispanic man in his 20’s, with short black hair and black eyes, driving a gray or gold older model Cadillac sedan with tinted back windows.