Tuesday, August 03, 2004
2 men, woman, suspects in burglary, indicted in break-ins
The trio, indicted by a Franklin County grand jury, have been charged in Roanoke County also.
But these charges may be just the tip of the iceberg for the trio. Roanoke County police have charged the three in connection with a July burglary there and say they consider them to be suspects in seven other burglaries. The three were arrested July 26 in Roanoke after a homeowner surprised them in the act, police said Monday. Brandon Sterling Jordan, 23, and Kimberly Sue Cox, 33, of Roanoke, and Timothy Raymond Hicks, 29, of Roanoke County, have each been indicted in Franklin County on charges of possessing a firearm while being a convicted felon, two counts of felony destruction of property, three counts of breaking and entering and three counts of grand larceny.
Roanoke County police have charged each of the trio with burglary and grand larceny. All three are being held in the Roanoke City Jail.
Through the month of July, Roanoke County police worked to solve a series of apparently related home burglaries. The suspects stole jewelry and credit cards, which they would use to make purchases at Roanoke electronics stores before the owners canceled the cards, police said. Most of the burglaries happened in Southwest County, said county police Lt. Chuck Mason.
The Franklin County break-ins happened early July 20 at the Lake Centre strip mall along Virginia 122 at Westlake Corner. The suspects cut the phone lines to the shopping center, then broke into three of the mall businesses: Valley Team Mortgage; West Lake Medical Equipment and Scopes & Stuff; a telescope and camera supply store, said Franklin County investigator Tim Woods.
From Valley Team, the suspects took laptop computers, a stereo, a boom box, drinks and snacks; from West Lake Medical, they took computers and cameras; and from Scopes & Stuff, they took a variety of wares and smashed open glass showcases to take guns, Woods said.
But the trio returned to the stores later that morning, police said, and a witness spotted the blue Chevrolet Cavalier they were using and reported it to police. Woods said the three have said in interviews with police since their arrest that they realized they'd left a crowbar in one of the stores and returned to get it.
On July 26, the three tried to break into a house in the 3700 block of Chesterton Street in Southwest Roanoke, mistakenly thinking the owner wasn't home, police said. When the homeowner confronted the would-be intruders, they fled. The homeowner got a good enough look at them to give a detailed description to Roanoke police, Roanoke County police said.
Roanoke County detective Tony Ayers recognized the similarities in descriptions and drove to Melrose Avenue to watch for the Cavalier, police said. Soon after the attempted break-in, he spotted the car and followed it to the Caru Apartments in Northwest Roanoke. The trio took something from the car, went into one of the buildings, returned to the car and left. Roanoke police stopped the Cavalier at Melrose Avenue and 35th Street and arrested the three for the attempted burglary at Chesterton Street, Roanoke County police said.
Police said they found items from the Franklin County and Roanoke County thefts in the car and at the homes of the suspects. Police said they also found pawn tickets, which implied the suspects had pawned some of the stolen items.
Woods called the arrests a result of "good cooperation in all jurisdictions."
Roanoke police spokeswoman Shelly Alley declined to comment on that department's role in the cases, saying the investigation is ongoing.
