A 20-year-old man and two friends were allegedly robbed and forced inside the suspects’ vehicles early Wednesday morning while the man was visiting friends in El Dorado.
El Dorado police were called just after 4 a.m. to Medical Center of South Arkansas in reference to a kidnapping and they spoke with Trevor Hamilton, of Bearden, who had a small laceration on his right ear.
Hamilton told officers he had come to El Dorado to visit two friends and as the trio sat in his vehicle outside one of his friend’s residence in the 2400 block of Calion Road, two vehicles, a pickup truck and a white car, approached.
A group of men exited the vehicles and pulled the trio from Hamilton’s vehicle, taking three cellphones and a total of $30 cash, Hamilton said.
He said the suspects then forced him and one of his friends inside the pickup truck and the other friend into the car.
The suspects drove the trio to Camden.
During the drive, one of the suspects allegedly struck Hamilton on the right side of his head and his right ear with a firearm, he said.
Hamilton told officers that the suspects released them at a hotel in East Camden.
He said he reported the incident to the Ouachita County Sheriff’s Office, who advised him to also file a report with the El Dorado Police Department.
Police said Hamilton could not provide the name of the East Camden hotel, a description of the suspects or any other details about the incident.
Identity theft
El Dorado police are investigating two separate incidents in which a local man and a woman reported receiving what appeared to be fraudulent letters from the Arkansas Department of Workforce Services.
The complainants said they were notified that someone had used their identities to apply for unemployment benefits with the ADWS.
On Dec. 9, an El Dorado woman told officers that she received a written notice that appeared to have come from the ADWS saying that someone used her name to file a claim on Aug. 13.
Upon the advice of her accountant, the woman said she called a “fraud hotline number” that appeared on the bottom of the letter but no one answered the call.
She said she received a voicemail on Nov. 30 from an unknown number, noting that the caller identified himself as a representative of ADWS and asked for her Social Security number.
The woman said she did not return the call.
An El Dorado man reported Monday that he received a letter notifying him that someone had used his identity to file for up to $14,900 in unemployment benefits in relation to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
He said the letter appeared to have come from ADWS.
The man told officers that he spoke with an ADWS representative, who said a woman filed the claim on July 1 and cited a business, Barker Bakery, as a part of the filing.
The complainant said he also learned that unemployment benefits had been issued for 35 weeks, totaling $14,900.