MIAMI – A homeless man has been arrested, accused of robbing a man who was trying to help him.
The victim thought the homeless man was asking for money, but instead found himself face to face with a knife.
As a result, the day after Christmas is a day 24-year-old Jose Cabeza will not soon forget.
“I was very, very scared,” he said.
Cabeza lives in Downtown Miami. He explained that he was FaceTiming with his girlfriend while walking to and from the gas station.
“When I was walking back from the gas station to my house, there was a homeless man who called me and I thought he was asking for some money,” he said.
But Cabeza soon realized that 48-year-old Richard Williams was not just looking for money.
Williams pulled a knife on Cabeza, snatched his chain, sat him on the ground and took the wallet from his front pocket, grabbing credit cards, a debit card and $24 in cash
“I don’t know why he didn’t rob my iPhone,” Cabeza said. “I guess because he knew you could track an iPhone and he was smart in that point.”
Cabeza said he was grateful that Williams didn’t take the phone because his girlfriend was on FaceTime during the entire robbery, recording on her end to get pictures and video of the knife-wilding criminal.
“She was very scared, and she said go home, go home,” Cabeza said. “When I got home, we just kept talking, I was crying because I was very scared.”
Cabeza would use the pictures and video to give to police, and just one day after the incident, police located Williams and arrested him.
With the brazen assailant behind bars, Cabeza is grateful for the arrest and that things didn’t end worse for him
“If the guy wanted to kill me, he could have and I don’t know that anyone would’ve known,” he said.