Madison Police suspect that one person has been behind the five armed robberies of cab drivers in south Madison this month.
The five incidents involved a man entering a cab as a fare, producing an object victims perceived to be a handgun and fleeing on foot after taking the driver's money. None of the drivers were injured.
'We're very on top of trying to catch this individual,' Madison Police Department public information officer Mike Hanson said.
The incidents occurred primarily in the Allied Drive neighborhood, south of the Beltline Highway and Verona Road. However, one of the robberies took place closer to campus, on the 2500 block of Fish Hatchery Road south of the University of Wisconsin Arboretum.
'We're involved in the neighborhood,' Hanson said. 'We do have officers working in plain clothes in the area.'
Police reports describe a young, black male of medium build between 5'8\ and 5'11"".
'We do believe that it could be the same suspect,' Hanson said, 'but we're not ruling out that there may be others out there.'
The MPD held a press conference Thursday to describe efforts to apprehend the suspect and gain community support.
A Badger Cab representative declined to comment until a later date out of concern for the drivers' safety. Due to city ordinances, cab companies cannot deny service to certain neighborhoods except under extreme circumstances.
