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The subject of last week’s cover story could be excused for figuring that the worst was behind her. But today, as D.C. hostess Philippa Hughes was making her way to a meeting, a man attempted to mug her at 13th and Q streets NW.
“I’m got some scratches and I’m a little shaken up but look who’s lying on the ground bleeding!” said Hughes, no worse for wear. She dusted off her shoulders, snapped the photo above of Metro Police Department officers detaining the suspect, and uploaded the image to Facebook.
“I just got raked over in the City Paper and survived,” she told me, writer who did the raking over. So she was ready to defend herself against her would-be mugger, to whom she boasts: “Did you really think you could take me down?”
UPDATE: More details on this case.
Hughes was talking on her cell phone and walking in Shaw when the man tried to snatch it from her hands. But Hughes wouldn’t let go. In the struggle, he broke free. She ran after him, screaming — loud enough to summon College of Art and Design professor Lucy Hogg, who lives in the area, to her front door. The alleged mugger, who was apparently off balance, ran into the car in the picture.
A plains-clothes officer jumped the suspect immediately. He cuffed the mug as three more police cars arrived.
The officers told Hughes that this suspect was wanted in other snatching cases. The plains-clothes officer, who happened to be in the area to see the whole thing go down, called in for backup and was ready to act at the right moment, Hughes said.