A 29-year-old Minneapolis woman is charged with aggravated robbery after she allegedly threatened a man with a knife and stole his phone while he was giving her a ride in Crystal.
Queen Joyaga Cobbs was charged with second-degree aggravated robbery. She is being held on $50,000 bail without conditions or $20,000 with conditions including no contact with the victim and no possession of weapons.
According to the criminal complaint, law enforcement responded to a reported robbery in Crystal on Tuesday, April 14. The victim reported he had lent his phone to Cobbs while he was giving her a ride in his car. Cobbs did not return the phone, threatened to stab the man and implied she had a knife. An unknown man also threatened to shoot the victim.
READ MORE > Minneapolis coverage
The victim showed law enforcement a GPS phone-finding app that placed the phone outside an apartment Cobbs is known to frequent. Officers went to the apartment and spoke with a person inside who denied anyone else was there.
The person showed call history on her phone that indicated recently deleted calls. While officers were still speaking with her, Cobbs appeared in the living room. She was wearing white mid-thigh shorts matching the description the victim had given.
Officers later conducted a photo lineup, and the victim identified Cobbs as the woman who threatened him and took his phone.
It wasn’t the first time Cobbs had been arrested by Crystal police this year. Booking records show she was arrested by Crystal police on March 13 on probable cause for second-degree assault but was released the same day without charges being filed.
READ MORE > Hennepin County coverage
While Cobbs was in custody on the robbery charge, prosecutors also filed a third-degree drug sale case against her on Friday, April 17. That complaint alleges that on Aug. 27, 2025, officers watching a bus rapid transit stop at N. 8th Street and Hennepin Avenue through a live camera feed observed Cobbs make a hand gesture to another person as though she wanted to give them something.
The person approached, pulled out cash and handed it to Cobbs. She then pulled out several small white rocks, separated them in her palm and handed two of them to the buyer. Officers arrested her and found 0.35 grams of fentanyl on her person. Bail in that case was set at $10,000.
Cobbs was convicted in 2017 of first-degree property damage with foreseeable risk of bodily harm in a case that also involved terroristic threats. That conviction was deemed a gross misdemeanor.
Her next court appearance on the robbery charge is scheduled for May 12.
