Tug-of-war with woman’s purse leads to armed-robbery charge

A 19-year-old man faces an armed robbery charge for allegedly stealing a woman’s purse while in possession of a handgun in East Central Spokane.

A man approached a parked car Friday morning near Sprague Avenue and Lacey Street, reached through the passenger window and grabbed a purse. The woman in the driver’s seat attempted to hold onto the purse, but the man took it after a brief tug-of-war, according to court documents.

Witnesses noticed he had a gun and followed him to a house about a block away on Lacey, court documents say.

Officers identified Simon J. Sohng as a suspect, contacted him by phone and persuaded him to come out about an hour after the robbery occurred, according to court documents. Sohng initially denied robbing the woman but said her purse “most likely would be found in his house,” court documents say.

During a search of the house, officers found numerous prescription pills and “several large bundles of U.S. currency,” court documents say. They found the woman’s purse in an upstairs crawl space, her checkbook in a shoebox in Sohng’s bedroom and a .357 revolver hidden behind some scrap wood in the basement.

Sohng allegedly responded by telling detectives, “It wasn’t even loaded” and “didn’t have any bullets.”

During a hearing Monday in Spokane County Superior Court, Judge Gregory Sypolt set Sohng’s bond at $30,000. He said Sohng is a flight risk because he has tickets to fly to South Korea on Aug. 19, where he planned to live with his aunt.

Sohng has never been convicted of a crime, but he was detained as a juvenile for battery in 2011, according to court documents.