Man robs woman with disability after he builds her bookcase, VA officials say
After helping a woman who has a disability and her neighbor put together a bookcase, a Virginia man returned to her apartment and robbed her, Virginia officials said.
Terrance Allen Skinner, 29, was convicted of “robbery, burglary with the intent to commit robbery, and conspiring to commit those two felonies” after he and another person were accused of forcing their way into the woman’s home and taking her money, the Office of the Commonwealth’s Attorney for the City of Norfolk said in a June 16 news release.
According to officials, Skinner came back to the woman’s apartment in Norfolk at about 10 p.m. Oct. 6 and demanded she hand over a savings notebook that she pulled cash from to tip him and her neighbor after they built her bookcase.
When he knocked on her door that night, Skinner told the woman he was her neighbor, officials said. Then, he and an unidentified person pushed their way inside when she opened the door, knocking her to the ground, according to officials.
“Skinner and his accomplice rifled through the victim’s belongings while yelling at her and demanding the location of the cash,” officials said.
When she told them she would have to crawl to get to her savings notebook, Skinner told her to do it, according to officials.
She then handed over the notebook, which had about $200 in cash, and Skinner and the other person took it along with her cell phone and left the apartment, officials said.
Shortly after, someone helped the woman call the police, and Skinner was found outside a home and arrested, officials said.
“Skinner and his accomplice committed a particularly blameworthy and immoral crime: using the kindness of a disabled person to set her up and victimize her for her kindness,” Norfolk Commonwealth’s Attorney Ramin Fatehi said in the release.
He is set to be sentenced Aug. 8, according to officials.
