Staffers at a restaurant in the Potomac Yard area recently fought off a knife-wielding attempted robber and are telling their story.
On the night of Sept. 1, manager Merve McDonald was behind the counter at Omar’s Pitas & Platters (3100 Richmond Highway) and turned his back momentarily when the commotion started.
Employees at a local business fought off a knife-wielding robber at a restaurant near Potomac Yard on Sept. 1, and the 64-year-old suspect is being held without bond after police found him hiding under his mother’s bed.
Around 11:15 p.m., the suspect allegedly walked into the restaurant in the 3100 block of Richmond Highway holding a large hunting knife. Staff reported that he jumped on the front counter and demanded they open the register. Instead, the three employees threw things at the suspect and injured him with a large grill scraper, according to a recently released search warrant affidavit.
The Alexandria Police Department is investigating the theft of multiple cartons of cigarettes after a clerk was pepper sprayed at a gas station near Potomac Yard.
The employee reported that around 7 a.m. on Saturday, Aug. 22, the suspect walked into the convenience store of the Exxon gas station at 2320 Richmond Highway and asked what time they started serving food. The clerk responded, and the suspect then allegedly pepper-sprayed the clerk, walked behind the counter and stole multiple cartons of Newport cigarettes, according to a recently released search warrant affidavit.
A rollover crash in Potomac Yard sent two people to the hospital Sunday (Sept. 13), according to the Alexandria Police Department.
Police and fire units responded around 3:12 p.m. to Richmond Highway and E. Reed Avenue. An APD spokesperson told ALXnow two vehicles were involved.
Office vacancies are trending down in Alexandria, although Old Town and Old Town North are going against the trend.
That’s according to the Alexandria Economic Development Partnership’s Mid-Year Market Report released Tuesday (Sept. 8) looking at commercial real estate trends for the first half of the year through June 30, 2026.
Thousands of additional Dominion Energy customers are experiencing power outages Tuesday morning (Sept. 8) after an earlier outage tied to a transformer.
As of 11 a.m., more than 4,300 customers are without power in North Ridge, Fairlington/Bradlee, Seminary Hill, Taylor Run, Rosemont and Del Ray. Dominion Energy attributed the outage to a circuit being out and estimated that restoration would happen between 2-5 p.m.
Just in time for school, AT&T gave away 115 free refurbished laptops to students and families at its Potomac Yard location in Alexandria on Thursday (Aug. 20).
With a waitlist of more than 7,000 people, the 115 recipients were pre-selected via lottery. The event was the last of 10 distributions across the country this summer.
A 19-year Alexandria woman has been found guilty by a jury to charges related to the death of a man who was struck by a train last September at the Potomac Yard Metro station.
Jamaya Ann Burch was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and assault and battery for her actions on Sept. 22, 2025 leading to the death of 40-year-old James Halley Lynt. The jury found that Burch and her then-girlfriend attacked Lynt at the Metro station, leading to him trying to escape by jumping down from the station platform and getting struck by a train.
A 19-year-old Alexandria woman has pleaded not guilty to charges related to the death of a man who was struck by a train and later died last summer at the Potomac Yard Metro station.
Prosecutors allege that 40-year-old James Halley Lynt was trying to escape being attacked by then-18-year-old Jamayah Burch and her then-17-year-old girlfriend when he jumped from a Metro platform, walked across train tracks and was struck by a train as it left the station.
The deployment of autonomous sidewalk delivery robots is expanding further in Alexandria.
Serve Robotics announced today (Monday) that the Wonder food hall at 3615 Richmond Highway will offer robot deliveries. The New York City-based Wonder, which has been rapidly expanding in the D.C. region and beyond, opened the Potomac Yard location in January.
Eleven tech startups with high prospects of growth have joined Alexandria’s first-ever tech accelerator program, the Alexandria Economic Development Partnership announced with program manager FedTech and the City of Alexandria Wednesday (Aug. 12).
The 11 participants were chosen among 41 applications for the Accelerate ALX program beginning in August. According to AEDP, the companies “represent high-growth sectors including defense, aerospace, health tech, artificial intelligence and machine learning, and cybersecurity.”
