HUNTINGTON BEACH : Woman Is Robbed, Stabbed in Carport

Police are searching for a man who stabbed a 19-year-old woman in the carport of her apartment complex and ran away with her purse, authorities said Wednesday.

The woman, whose name was withheld by police, suffered bruises and a minor puncture wound to her right shoulder. She was treated and released at Humana Hospital-Huntington Beach.

The victim told police that she was grabbed from behind while walking to her car Tuesday morning at the Huntington Highlander apartments on Sher Lane, Police Lt. Edward McErlain said.

The attacker is described as a white man in his late 20s or early 30s, about 5 feet, 8 inches tall and weighing about 175 pounds. The man has neck-length brown hair, a mustache and a small tattoo on his right forearm.

During a struggle for the woman’s purse, the man knocked her to the ground and stabbed her. Police said the weapon was not a knife.

About an hour after the attack, the assailant tried to use a credit card stolen from the purse at a service station in the area.

The cashier, who declined to be named, said the man drove away without paying for $24 worth of gasoline when asked for additional identification. He was last seen in a 1975 or 1976 turquoise Ford LTD with out-of-state yellow-and-black license plates.

The employee reported the gasoline theft to police, who put out an advisory on the stolen credit cards and the man’s car.

At 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, the man tried to use the victim’s department store credit card to purchase men’s clothing at a Mervyn’s in Cypress, said Louie Villanueva, a district investigator for Mervyn’s.

Again, the man fled when asked for additional identification. Later that day, a customer found some of the woman’s credit cards and other contents of the purse in the Mervyn’s parking lot, Villanueva said.