Vicksburg police are ramping up routine patrols following a spate of 10 armed robberies in the past nine days — half of which were reported in areas near Washington and Oak streets now under increased patrol.

Four occurred in less than two hours Thursday night. While injuries were not reported by most of the victims, all have described young men, weapons and money.

“We are aware and we are being more vigilant,” Police Chief Tommy Moffett said.

The most recent holdups began at 9:45 p.m. Thursday, when a victim reported to police he was robbed at gunpoint while sitting in his car in the 800 block of Beech Street, which is near First North Street. When the victim pulled out his pockets to show he didn’t have any money, the suspect fled, according to the victim.

At 10:07 p.m., another victim reported that he was robbed at gunpoint in the 1300 block of Washington Street after making an ATM withdrawal on Clay Street, reports said. The suspect, described to police as a black male about 6 feet tall wearing a red ball cap, T-shirt and blue jeans, fled north on Washington Street after taking $20 from the victim.

A similarly attired trio of young, black males was reported to have held up a man in the 200 block of Berryman Road, which runs off East Clay Street, at 10:30 p.m. The victim said he grabbed a shotgun that was pulled on him by the would-be robbers before the men fled on foot. Police recovered an antique, double-barrel shotgun from the scene Friday morning.

At 11:34 p.m., a couple reported the fourth such incident of the night, at City Front. Two black males about 5-foot-5 to 6 feet tall approached a couple sitting in their car talking and made off with a cell phone and $80 in cash. The suspects were seen running north on Levee Street, according to police.

Six previous armed robberies reported to police between April 30 and May 5 detailed much the same — male victims reporting cash and cell phones taken from them by young males in their late teens to late 20s. One, in the 1400 block of First North Street, resulted in knife wounds to the victim as he tried to run away from the suspects. The unidentified victim was treated and released from River Region Medical Center the next day.

No arrests have been made in any of the reported armed robberies, and Vicksburg police Lt. Bobby Stewart said Friday that it’s too early to tell if the reports are linked to the same suspects.

Of Vicksburg’s 70 or so sworn officers, eight or nine patrol the city’s six beats per shift. Since Monday, a roving patrolman has been added to police beat 3, which covers the central part of the city. The renewed area of focus — effectively a seventh beat — covers Washington Street between Clark Street to the south, Depot Street to the north and west to the Mississippi River and Yazoo Diversion Canal, police said.

“As things start to happen, we’ll move them from one area to another,” Moffett said.

A similar realignment of officers followed a stretch of violence on Speed Street nearly a year ago, when the VPD created “a beat within a beat” after a man was shot to death on his porch in the 700 block and an attempted drive-by shooting happened near Marshall Street. Six arrests resulted from the two incidents. Moffett credited the tactic for reducing crime around Togo Street and Military Avenue earlier in his 7 1/2-year tenure as chief, while mentioning the demolition-in-progress to an apartment complex at what was once Speed Street School for reducing crime in that neighborhood.

“(The strategy) has been real good,” Moffett said. “We are absolutely confident we’ll make an arrest.”

Mindful of the politics surrounding any crime issue in a year when he is asking voters for a third term, Mayor Laurence Leyens said he backs the department in its quest to control all types of crime in all areas of the city.

“Any type concerns me,” Leyens said. “We have a full force and they’re being very aggressive about it.”

Ranks of the Vicksburg Police Department were thinned as part of a wide-ranging overhaul when Leyens was first elected in 2001, the most significant of which was the hire of Moffett, who had retired as chief of the Biloxi Police Department. Nearly at its budgeted total of 105 officers when Moffett was appointed chief, the force dipped below 60 early last year. Two retirements have been more than offset by eight new hires, bringing the current total back to about 70, Moffett said.

“One of the downsides to hiring people is that they want to live close to their area,” Moffett said, referring to the recruitment of officers from places such as the Jackson-metro area in the past year when fuel prices rocketed to $4 a gallon. Those challenges remain even as prices at the pump went past $2 a gallon only in the past week.

“We definitely had an issue when they first went up,” Moffett said. “(Coming to Vicksburg) ain’t going to last because it’s still better for them to work close to home. But, a good policeman will find work.”

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Contact Manivanh Chanprasith at mchanprasith@vicksburgpost.com

Contact Danny Barrett Jr. at dbarrett@vicksburgpost.com