Howard County police are investigating an attempted robbery at the Mall in Columbia and a robbery of a woman in Fulton last week.

About 8: 30 p.m. Thursday, a woman was about to enter her car at the mall when a man displayed what she thought was a gun, police said.

The woman screamed and the man fled without taking anything, police said.

Later that night, a Columbia woman was walking to her car from the High's convenience store on Murray Hill Road in Fulton when a man pointed a handgun at her, police said.

The robber took the woman's purse and fled, stealing a cellular phone, credit cards, checkbook and $100, police said.

Pub Date: 5/03/98