"On Saturday night, June 29, I was almost taken by multiple men and two trucks in Denver, Colorado," the woman, Victoria Robinson, says at the start of the video, which currently has over 635,000 views. "It was so well planned that I highly doubt they stopped after I got away. I have no idea if they tried to grab someone else that night."
Robinson's story was posted on her TikTok page on July 3, the same day she filed a police report on what allegedly happened to her, according to DPD officials. She says on video that she called in the attempted abduction shortly after it went down, in the early hours of June 30, and that the cops confirmed that at least one other person "saw the abduction attempt and called it in as well."
However, Denver police tell Westword there's no record of anyone reporting an attempted abduction that night other than Robinson — and other details about her story don't match up with what cops and her husband say happened.
"It was three callers," says DPD spokesman Jay Casillas, noting how there was no mention of a potential abduction in the other calls.
Victoria Robinson's TikTok on her alleged abduction experience has been viewed more than 630K times.
Victoria Robinson/TikTok
However, Department of Public Safety communications director Kelly Jacobs later reached out to Westword to say that the DPD had "found an error in the way [Robinson's] first call was handled" by the dispatcher.
"The caller did mention that she believed this to be an attempted abduction during her initial call," Jacobs says.
"The call taker added the information she provided to another 'suspicious occurrence' call stating that men in ski masks were taking items from a truck nearby. Once the caller said she thought it was an attempted abduction, the call taker should have updated the nature code from 'suspicious occurrence' to 'kidnap.' The call taker also should have included that the caller believed this to be an attempted abduction in the call notes, which is why DPD said an attempted abduction was not mentioned the first time she called."
While investigating Robinson's claims, Casillas says, the detective on her case located a call from around 12:49 a.m. on June 30 — right when calls began coming from Robinson and at least one other witness — about a truck being stolen in the area of West Alameda and South Navajo with stand-up scooters in the back of it.
Another call came in around 12:51 a.m. from a person near West Cedar Avenue and Tejon (roughly five blocks away), who saw two suspicious individuals in ski masks unloading items from a truck before driving away from the area and heading southbound toward Alameda.
Robinson called around the same time, according to Casillas, who says she reported that two men in a truck had pulled up on her suspiciously near Alameda and Tejon, two blocks south of where the last call had come from. She said the men were in ski masks and began "pulling stuff out of a truck" before allegedly approaching Robinson, prompting her to scream and the individuals to run away.
"She states she screams when she saw them and they left," Casillas says, adding that "after she screamed, [the men] ran."
Cops say the stolen scooter truck was found abandoned by its owner later that night near Alameda and Tejon.
Speaking to Westword through direct messages on TikTok, Robinson confirms that cops told her they were looking into whether she may have been "in the wrong place at the wrong time" and not the victim of an attempted abduction, which she insists wasn't the case.
"The detective I talked to...said there was an attempted vehicle theft in the area, about five blocks away, at roughly the same time I called the cops," Robinson says. "He said it was a black truck filled with lime scooters (or another type of scooter) and the person picking them up and taking them to be recharged had gotten out of his truck while it was running, and then someone jumped in and took off. Apparently this black truck was also then found on the street I was on. He said maybeeee I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and what I saw was actually the drivers switching around cars? I told him absolutely not."
According to Robinson, men in a white four-door truck and a white tow truck with neon green lights were responsible for her attempted kidnapping. She says they drove up on her and tried to corner her while she was looking for her dog, which had escaped from her home nearby because of fireworks being set off.
"Immediately, I knew something was wrong," Robinson says in her TikTok video. "These trucks just arrived out of nowhere. They were clearly watching and waiting. And I think they just assumed that I was a girl going for a midnight run with my dog."
At the end of the TikTok, Robinson says she believes a total of three people were involved in the alleged abduction attempt.
"One person driving each truck and then another person who jumped out; he was wearing dark pants, a white long-sleeved shirt and a full neck gaiter that covered his face up to his eyes," she says.
Her husband, however, tells Westword that Robinson was actually mistaken about what she saw and admitted that there's several inaccuracies in her video — insisting it was only two men who tried abducting Robinson, and that they didn't run away — along with other contradicting details.
"She wanted to get this out there for women in the area," says Cass Carter, Robinson's husband. "She didn't understand exactly what she saw that night, because it happened so quick. And with the fear of her dog being lost...and being attacked and chased by a fucking man...I get why she was confused. But I saw the whole thing happen, and I'm not going to lie to you. Because this isn't about us anymore. It's about everyone else out there."
According to Carter, a man in a tow truck and another man in another "truck" had pulled up on Robinson at the intersection of Alameda and Tejon, like she claims, only they didn't immediately begin approaching her.
Instead, Carter tells Westword that one of the males stayed in their vehicle while the driver of the tow truck got out and tried running up to grab Robinson. He says the tow truck "turned on the right hand side, northbound on Alameda" and the other truck went "on the opposite side of Tejon," though he wouldn't specify where exactly.
"He pulled up another 300 feet past the tow truck where he stopped," Carter explains. "When I turned around, the tow truck driver hopped out of his truck and made a big loop in the opposite lane and went towards where my wife was walking with her dog. Coincidence, that's where the other truck was sitting."
According to Carter, Robinson took off running toward him and they met at the intersection of Tejon and Alameda. "When we got back to the intersection and met, the other truck backed up all the way up to the tow truck, the guy stood in between both cars, holding his tow truck door open, full face mask staring me down."
Carter says he told his wife "we have to run" before the two of them darted home.
"We got to our block, I peaked around the corner, and then they slowly started pulling out of the fucking street," he tells Westword, contradicting Robinson's 911 claims about the men running away after she screamed.
"It was a staged, planned attack," he insists.
Asked why he was so certain it was an attempted abduction attempt and not some other type of nefarious encounter — such as an attempted assault or run-in with the scooter truck thieves — Carter says it was "because of the way that trucks were staged, and how the guy did a loop and to the other lane and then cut over, disappeared, and then I heard my wife scream."
"He ran in the opposite lane towards where the truck was and then cut over to where he disappeared in front of his truck before I heard my wife screaming my name from way across the street," Carter says. "Again, I know what happened. I know what I saw. I was there. I witnessed the whole thing. The guy stared me down from across the street. The truck backed up to the tow truck and he stared us down. They had full face masks on. It was planned."
DPD is currently investigating Robinson's claims.
"We are looking into everything," Casillas says, noting how investigators are gathering evidence on "what could have been perceived and what could have happened or not happened."
Speaking to Westword, Robinson stuck by her story about the incident being an attempted abduction. She claims the DPD is "blatantly lying" and "attempting to cover this up," though she wouldn't say why.
"This actually makes me so infuriated that the Denver PD is so pathetically bad at their job," she says. "Not only did I VERY clearly call it in immediately after and explain every single detail of what happened, I told them they were likely still in the area and may try again with another person. Then, as my TikTok blew up, I contacted each business right there (Wing Stop, Little Caesar’s, Valverde elementary school) and each told me that they have footage from that night and would be happy to supply it to the cops."
According to Robinson, DPD investigators not only "fumbled" her case "so incredibly badly" by not listing her call as an attempted abduction report at first, but have been treating her poorly since everything went down.
"A cop actually came to my house, had a super-aggressive demeanor and tone with me until I reciprocated it and he finally calmed down," she tells Westword. "I had to repeat the story to him minimum three times before he ever took down a single note on his little note pad."
Asked if there was any possible way she could've been mistaken about what the two men in masks were actually doing that night, Robinson replies: "I wasn't mistaken, I know what happened and what I saw. I also believe the other person also had his truck stolen. Two horrible experiences can happen simultaneously, especially in this neighborhood."
When Westword first began speaking with Robinson, she granted permission to obtain a copy of her 911 call from June 30 and asked for one to be sent to her, as well. But she stopped responding to requests for more information or her email address. She also refused to talk over the phone about the incident after initially agreeing to do so.
Without explaining why, Robinson tells Westword in DMs that it is a "convenient story" for the DPD to just drop her case and say, "Oh she saw it wrong." But she stands by her claims and says that's not what happened here.
"I know what I saw and what happened," Robinson says. "I'm not an idiot. I know my surroundings, I know the feeling of a man with bad intentions. And my husband witnessed the entire thing and 1,000 percent backs me up that this was no carjacking. I have no doubt that may have happened around the same time. But it's not my story; that's not what I was part of."
This article was updated on July 13 to include statements from Cass Carter and Department of Public Safety communications director Kelly Jacobs about Victoria Robinson's initial 911 call on June 30.
