On Oct. 13, Sean Chen, a sophomore at the Rhode Island School of Design, was robbed and assaulted by two men on Meeting Street, according to a Providence Police Department report reviewed by The Herald.
Around 9:30 p.m., Chen was walking back to his dorm after eating dinner on Thayer Street when two unidentified male suspects approached him near the Bagel Gourmet on Meeting Street, Chen told The Herald.
“I took my earbuds off, and as they approached me, they were yelling at me, … and I wasn’t really comprehending what was happening,” he said. “I thought they were running towards me because they knew me.”
But as the men came closer, Chen realized this was not the case. While it was dark outside and he could not clearly make out their faces, one suspect was wearing all gray sweat clothing, while the other, who had a face mask on, wore all black, according to Chen.
The suspects demanded Chen hand over his wallet. When he hesitated, they began assaulting him.
They “started punching me, only on the face,” Chen said. “It was one punch to the nose and lip area, and another one to the right side of my face, at my jaw.”
“In the middle of all that, they were calling me slurs,” he added. While Chen is of Chinese descent, the suspects called him “the N-word,” he recalled.
Chen gave them his wallet, which had about $50 in cash. After taking the cash, the suspects then threw his wallet on the ground and took off.
“I was stumbling on the dark ground, trying to look for my glasses and my wallet,” Chen said.
After retrieving his belongings from the ground, Chen walked through Brown’s campus and back to his dormitory at RISD.
“There was blood all over my pants and stuff, and it was dripping down my face,” Chen said. While in his dorm, he noticed that his “jaw was swelling noticeably on the right side,” prompting him to call the PPD.
Since the assault did not happen on RISD’s campus, Chen did not think it was appropriate to call RISD’s Department of Public Safety to address the incident, he said.
“RISD was notified after the incident occurred and initiated our protocols for supporting the affected student once they were back on campus,” RISD Spokesperson Jaime Marland wrote in an email to The Herald. “The health and wellbeing of all of our students is our top priority, and we are deeply committed to providing a safe and supportive campus environment for our students.”
Chen said RISD’s administration provided counseling resources and checked on his wellbeing. “I feel like they really made sure I was okay,” he added.
At his dorm, PPD officers asked Chen several questions about the attack, as well as if he would be able to pick the suspects out of a lineup. He said he would be unable to do so since the suspects’ faces were hard to make out in the darkness. Chen also told the officers that he did not wish to press charges against the assaulters.
Afterwards, the Providence Fire Department took Chen to the hospital, where he got a CT scan. His jaw was swollen, but “it wasn’t fractured or dislocated,” he said.
The following day, Detective Ibrahim Yousif called Chen to follow up about the incident, but Chen had no new information to share and confirmed that he did not wish to press charges.
“That’s kind of like a waste of the police’s efforts if I decide to press this matter and escalate it,” Chen said, calling it “impossible” for police to investigate much further since he didn’t get a clear look at the suspects.
Chen also believed the suspects were younger than him and “figured they were like high school kids,” so he “didn’t really want to press charges over $50 being taken,” he said.
Even after the attack, Chen still feels “pretty safe around the area,” he said.
“My friends have never heard of anyone getting mugged,” he noted. “It was a big shock to them. And since it was pretty close to campus, they started to be a little bit more alert and aware of things.”
“It was the wrong time, the wrong place,” he added. “I’ve been back (to Thayer Street), but not at night.”
Correction: A previous version of this article was published with a photo of a former Bagel Gourmet location. The article has been updated with a photo of the store's Meeting Street location. The Herald regrets the error.
Sanai Rashid lives in Long Island, New York. As an English and Economics concentrator, she is passionate about storytelling and how numbers and data create narratives in ways words alone cannot. When she is not writing, you can find her trying new pizza places in Providence or buying another whale stuffed animal.
