TWO MORE women yesterday reported being attacked by a masked man, bringing police enquiries back to square one as a man arrested on Wednesday was ruled out as a suspect for a series of rapes and sexual assaults across Nicosia.
The first attack took place in the Ayioi Omoloyites area of Nicosia at around 2am. A 33-year old local woman had just parked her car in the underground car park of the building where she lives, and was preparing to enter the building when she saw a balaclava-clad man approaching her. She ran back to her car and locked the doors, but the man tried repeatedly to open the door. The woman then started up the car and called the police, who didn’t arrive in time to catch the man.
The second attack took place in the same area just after 2am. A 30-year old foreign woman was attacked while standing in the entrance of the building where she lives. The man punched her, causing grievous bodily harm, but was scared away when the victim started screaming.
The number of attacks is on an alarming increase as the latest attacks bring the number of recent incidents to seven in the past month alone. In the five previous attacks women were injured, robbed, sexually assaulted and in two cases raped.
Descriptions given by most of the women indicated that the culprit was not Cypriot and was well-built.
But Police Spokesman Demetris Demetriou told the Cyprus Mail yesterday that there had been other descriptions that didn’t match.
“A sketch has been drawn up of the man with the help of his victims’ descriptions. But later on we were also given different descriptions, so things are very complicated. That is why we haven’t published the picture yet.”
This latest information appears to confirm speculation that police might be dealing with more than one masked attacker. Justice Minister Doros Theodorou was among the first to express the opinion that criminals had found an opportunity to carry out attacks under the pretence of being the infamous masked rapist.
Police had arrested a Sri Lankan man yesterday morning in the belief that he was the man behind the attacks. The man, who was wearing a black woolly hat and gloves, was acting suspiciously, police said, and was arrested. It later turned out that the man was an illegal immigrant.
Police took DNA samples, but tests carried out yesterday proved the man had not been involved in the recent attacks.
The man from Sri Lanka is now being held by Immigration police.
“Police are doing everything they can to put a stop to this phenomenon and we believe that it won’t be long before the man or men to blame are found,” said Demetriou.
