FAIRFAX, Va., Aug. 11 (UPI) -- Police are now investigating nine attacks on young women and teenagers whose buttocks were slashed with a box cutter or razor at Virginia shopping malls.
The most recent attack was on a teenager at the XXI Forever store in Fair Oaks Mall in Fairfax County, Va., July 25.
Fairfax police said none of the nine victims was seriously injured, The Washington Post reported.
Surveillance video indicates the suspect is a heavyset 5-foot-6 Latino in his late 20s, police said.
Similar slashings occurred at Tysons Corner, with one reported at Marshalls at the Greenbriar Shopping Center, and one at the T.J. Maxx at Fairfax Towne Center.
The attacks started in February at Fair Oaks Mall, where five victims were slashed, said Fairfax police spokeswoman Lucy Caldwell. Caldwell said in most of the assaults, the suspected distracted the victim before cutting her.
The suspect appears to pick his victims randomly, Caldwell said.
In the July 25 attack, the teen said she noticed a man picking up clothes that had fallen off a rack at the Fair Oaks Mall store when she felt a pain in her buttocks and discovered she was bleeding.