'Say A Prayer' Robberies in Hollywood

HOLLYWOOD, CA (FOX 11) - Jade Willey came to Hollywood to act and tell stories. Well he has quite the story to tell now, but it's one he never wanted.

It's his own story of how two men robbed him at gunpoint on his way from the gym to his home last night just after midnight. He says it happened under the freeway overpass at Argyle and Franklin--a busy intersection by day, a bit creepy and dark at night, despite the efforts of the operators of a new hotel, the Emory, to try to clean up the area and make it walkable and neighbor friendly.

Fortunately, the two men who help up Willey didn't shoot him and let him go, telling him to ''have a nice night'' but only after forcing him to his knees and telling him to ''say a prayer''.

Chilling. Very upsetting.

Willey says detectives told him there have been at least three similar robberies just this week in this area, a fact the LAPD has been unable to confirm for me as of this writing despite me having started asking that fairly straightforward question of them since Wednesday morning.

At any rate, Willey said the two young African Americans wearing hoodies, who were calm and professional sounding, said they sounded as if they knew what they were doing--that they have no doubt they've done this before.

He felt they were apparently not part of the homeless or mentally ill population that often camps under the freeway at that location--the same location Fox 11 has been reporting on.

It's near where NCIS actress Pauley Perrette was attacked years ago, near where we did the follow up to the fact that her attacker, a homeless man, was released onto the same streets again about a month ago.

As for Mr. Willey, he's more than happy to have simply gotten out of the situation unharmed. The robbers took his cell phone as that's all he had on him of value. He'd left his wallet at home.