Related Post
(Trends Wide) — A man police have dubbed the “shopping cart killer” may be linked to the body of a fifth victim found in Washington, authorities said Friday.
Anthony Robinson, 35, has already been charged with the murder of two women.
Investigators believe Anthony Robinson met his victims on dating websites and allegedly lured them to motels where he then killed them and transported their bodies in shopping carts.
Police received a “major tip” this week that could connect Robinson to another case in which a woman’s body was found in a shopping cart in Washington, DC, he said. Ed O’Carroll, chief of Major Crimes Cyber and Forensics for the Fairfax County Sheriff’s Office at a press conference on Friday.
“That deceased woman in a shopping cart was covered only with a blanket. We believe this may be the fifth victim of Anthony Eugene Robinson,” O’Carroll said. He added that digital evidence places Robinson in the same neighborhood at the time of the victim’s disappearance.
Robinson was charged in November in the deaths of Elizabeth Redmond, 54, of Harrisonburg, and Tonita Lorice Smith, 39, of Charlottesville. Investigators found their bodies on Nov. 23 in an open lot in Harrisonburg, Virginia, according to Harrisonburg police.
Police reported that video surveillance and cell phone records connecting Robinson to Redmon and Smith led to their arrest. He is currently being held at the Rockingham County Adult Detention Center in North Carolina on two counts of manslaughter, in addition to two felony counts of concealing, transporting or altering a corpse, authorities said.
Trends Wide has reached out to the Rockingham County Adult Detention Center and Anthony Guglielmi, director of the Fairfax County Police Office of Public Affairs for comment.
Other alleged victims identified
Speaking at Friday’s news conference, Fairfax County Police Chief Kevin Davis said DNA evidence has confirmed the identity of two other women believed to be Robinson’s victims.
Cheyenne Brown, 29, of Washington, and Stephanie Harrison, 48, of Redding, California, were found in a dumpster near a shopping cart near the Moon Inn motel in Alexandria, Virginia, on December 15.
Authorities believe that Brown had taken the subway from the city of Washington to the Huntington subway stop in Virginia on September 30 and never returned. Robinson may have been the last person to have contact with her, O’Carroll said in December.
Police had determined that Robinson was communicating with Brown through a dating website just prior to her disappearance and cell phone records indicated that Robinson and Brown were in contact “in and around the area” of the Moon Inn motel in Richmond. Highway in Alexandria, Virginia, Harrisonburg Police Chief Kelley Warner said in December.
“We discovered that Robinson has stayed at the Moon Inn motel on at least five other occasions, and we need to know more,” Davis said.
The police chief indicated that the officials requested the support of the Behavioral Analysis Unit of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to obtain more information about Robinson. They also work with authorities in Robinson’s home state of New York, as well as the Harrisonburg Police Department in Virginia.
“In addition, we are working on a victimology profile and hope to contact other women who may have interacted with Robinson,” Davis said.
Police urge anyone with information about Robinson to contact authorities immediately.
“We believe there are other people who have had contact with Robinson who can provide us with crucial information about him,” Davis added.
Trends Wide’s Emma Tucker contributed to this report.
