A Washington D.C. news crew was robbed Friday while investigating an app that warns users of sketchy neighborhoods.
“Tonight was a heck of a night,” WUSA9 reporter Mola Lenghi said in an interview with the station.
The crew was conducting interviews about the app “SketchFactor” in the Petworth neighborhood in Northwest, D.C. when their van was broken into and burglarized. A purse, several backpacks, photography gear, laptop and other electronics were stolen.
“It led us to the Petworth neighborhood of Northwest,” Lenghi explained. “Not gonna call it a sketchy neighborhood, but as folks were telling us that, you know, it was a good neighborhood and not much activity happens around there, as that was being told to us, our van was robbed.”
The crew eventually located the intern’s phone and some of the other missing items in a dumpster using the “Find my iPhone” app, but Lenghi said thousands of dollars worth of items are still out there.
Lenghi was uncomfortable disclosing the location of the recovered stolen goods. “It led us to a couple of dumpsters in a, another sketchy neighborhood,” he told WUSA9. “We’ll give it the eyeball test, you don’t need an app to tell you that all the time.”
“We’re not going to tell you which neighborhood it was, but based on that it’s the type of place where stolen goods get dumped I guess,” reported Lenghi.
WUSA9 reports the crew emerged from the incident “unharmed.”
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