Watch out: Med Center-area thieves will grab phone out of your hand

Recent smartphone snatchings near the Texas Medical Center are a reminder to pedestrians to stay alert, officials say.

"Pay attention," said Inspector Stefan Happ of the University of Texas Police Department at Houston.

"People are distracted by their electronics all the time," he said. "When you're not paying attention to your surroundings, you (can) become a victim of crime."

The UT Police provides law enforcement and community services to the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center and University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

In two recent incidents, people on phones had them grabbed out of their hands.

At about 11:30 a.m. Dec. 13, a man was walking in the 8300 block of Knight Road, near UT's south campus, when a male assailant grabbed the pedestrian's iPhone 4 and took off running, Happ said.

The victim chased the suspect, who turned around and punched the man in the face before running away, Happ said. Aside from that encounter, the pedestrian was unhurt, the inspector said.

At about noon Dec. 16, a woman walking in the 1800 block of El Paseo lost her iPhone when a man stole it out of her hand, Happ said.

The two crimes might have been the work of different thieves, he said, because one man was described as having short hair and the other as having dreadlocks.

Both suspects, however, were in their mid-20s and about 5-7 or 5-8, Happ said.

As a result of the two reports, which triggered notices to students and employees of UT and MD Anderson, university police have assigned additional officers to the south campus "for the foreseeable future," Happ said.

The UT police, who are not bound by campus borders, work closely with the Houston Police Department to respond to crime and attempt to prevent it, he said.

Happ noted that many M.D. Anderson patients come from other states and even other countries and may be distracted by their illness.

"We can only do so much if they're walking around oblivious with a cell phone in their hands," Happ said.

The public can follow the department's announcements on Twitter at @utpolicehouston.