Suspect in two pharmacy
robberies caught in Virginia

A man charged with robbing two North Asheville pharmacies was arrested without incident by Front Royal, Va., police on Feb. 4.
Michael Jacob Ball, 37, of Oakley Street in Hendersonville had been charged with robbing the drugstores of cash and painkillers and fleeing to Virginia, where he knows someone, soon after the heists kast month.

The Asheville Police Department had entered Ball into the National Crime Information Center, after which Front Royal police located him and contacted the APD, police said.

“We couldn’t get to him until (Feb. 18) because “Virginia was essentially shut down by the snowstorms in the D.C. area,” APD spokeswoman Melissa Williams noted in an e-mail. “Detectives drove up and back in one day.”

Ball demanded drugs and money from Rite Aid, 846 Merrimon Ave. on Jan 26 and, less than two hours later, robbed the CVS, 612 Merrimon Ave.

While Ball told pharmacy employees that he was armed, he did not display a weapon in other case, police noted. Nobody was hurt in either heist.

Ball robbed Rite Aid of $208 in cash and CVS of $11,807 worth of oxycodone, according to warrants.

The suspect has a drug possession conviction dating from 2003, according to online records.

The Front Royal police arrested Ball on an existing APD warrant for financial card fraud, but details of what led to his arrest were not immediately available.

Ball was jailed in the Buncombe County Detention Center under $75,000 bond on two counts of common law robbery and one count of financial card fraud.

Resident charged with lighting
fire outside apartment unit

An Asheville man charged on Feb. 5 with setting an apartment fire — that officials said, posed a risk to the lives of dozens of people — was jailed under a $50,000 bond.

Zachary David Cole, 20, was arrested on a charge of first-degree arson.

The fire was set in the early morning hours at Grove Apartments, off Zillicoa Street, outside a unit on a third-floor landing, according to Buddy Thompson, chief of the Asheville-Buncombe Arson Task Force.

The conflagration caused minor damage to the unit’s vinyl siding and door.

Cole reportedly had been drinking alcohol with several other people in a different apartment before he set a bag of trash on fire.

While no one saw the suspect light the fire, it was later seen by residents who doused the blaze with a pot of water, Thompson said.

Later in the day, the fire was reported to authorities by a property manager. The arrest followed interviews with numerous residents.

Three people were inside the unit at the time of the fire. The complex, which is privately owned, primarily serves as housing for students at nearby UNC Asheville.

Cole lived in the complex, but is not a student, Thompson noted.

Man given eight-year term
for pair of scooter attacks

A Leicester man recently was sentenced to at least eight years in prison for attacking two scooter drivers, including one assault in which the victim was shot five times.

In both attacks, the victims were forced off the road with a car and had their mopeds stolen, Asheville police noted.

Brett Roger Griffin, 22, of Israel Road, pleaded guilt to two counts of robbery with a dangerous weapon, two counts of conspiracy to commit robbery with a dangerous weapon, assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury and aiding assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill.

Griffin was to be sentenced in early March in Buncombe County Superior Court to 96 to 134 months in state prison.

In the first incident, on Oct. 11, 2008. a man riding a scooter on Old County Home Road was forced off the road by two men and a woman and threatened with a baseball bat and gun, police said, noting that one of the suspects rode off with the scooter.

Two days later, a vehicle knocked another scooter drive down on North Bear Creek Road. The victim, 30, was shot five times in the legs and chest and struck with a piece of wood, police said. He spent nine days in the hospital, but survived.

The other attacker, Jeffrey Lane Gillespie, 26, of Pennant Road, Leicester, was sentenced earlier in February to 160 to 210 months in prison.

Three men face charges
in cross-dressing heists

Three men from Western North Carolina charged in a string of larcenies in Asheville-area stores were arrested by South Carolina authorities after fleeing from Traveloers Rest police and crashing their vehicle, police said.

The suspects often committed the crimes dressed as women, police said.

Travelers Rest police on Feb. 19 pulled over a car believed to have been used in a shoplifting incident at a Wal-Mart, and the driver fled after ramming the cruiser, police said.

The officer caught up with the car after it crashed on U.S. 25 near the intersection with Highway 414.

The men’s conditions were not immediately known.

Police said the vehicle’s occupants each were already facing multiple larceny charges and were identified as:
• Alvin James Ray Jr., 22, of Asheville.
• Tremain Allen Lucas, 19, of Asheville.
• Chester Dean Ray III, 18, of Arden.

Police said the men have stolen TVs, computer equipment and video game systems fom Asheville stores, such as Best Buy and Target over the last several months.

Two men caught pulling
up 500 railroad spikes

FLAT ROCK — Two men were caught pulling up hundreds of steel railroad spikes from a section of active train tracks near Flat Rock, according to Henderson County Sheriff Rick Davis.

A witness called 911 about 3:30 p.m. Feb. 28, reporting suspicious activity on the tracks, which are owned by Norfolk Southern Railroad, near West Blue Ridge Road.

Deputies said they found Cruz Mario Carnacion, 37, and José Luis Trejo-Yanez in possession of more than 500 7-inch spikes, which weigh about a half-pound each and can be sold as scrap.

Davis said the missing spikes could have caused the train to derail.

Deputies immediately called Norfolk Southern officials to report the theft and the possible threat to the integrity of the tracks.

The men were charged with felony conspiracy to damage railroad property, willful injury to railroad property and trespassing on railroad property.

Henderson County’s immigration program determined that the pair had entered the United States illegally, Davis said. They each were placed under a $25,000 bond and ordered held on Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainers pending deportation proceedings.

UNCA student faces drug charges after arrest in city

UNC Asheville police recently reported a student being charged with several drug violations on campus:

Robert Taylor Hampton was arrested on drug charges off campus on Merrimon Avenue at 4:28 p.m. Feb. 2. No specific address was provided in the police report.

Hampton, 19, of University Heights was charged with possession of 0.50 oz. of marijuana, 0.05 oz. of other hallucinogens and possession of paraphernalia for using drugs.

Hampton was held under a $1,000 unsecured bond

Other recent police-related activity at UNCA includes the following:

• Criminal damage to automobile tires owned by Heather Amber Hughes, 25, a non-resident, in Parking Lot C in an incident reported at 5:37 p.m. Jan. 30.
Three tires, valued at $225, on her 2001 Chevrolet Cavalier were damaged with a puncturing tool, UNCA police noted. Her vehicle was last known secure at 4:30 p.m. Jan. 29. The investigation is continuing.

• An arson of building materials valued at $2,000 in 627 Founders Hall was reported at 2:12 a.m. Jan. 24.
The building was last known secure at 2:11 a.m. Jan. 24, police said. The investigation is continuing.

• Larceny of $10 in U.S. currency from Ashley Danielle Hunt in an incident reported at 5:38 p.m. Jan. 26 at the Health & Fitness Center
Hunt,18, who is a student living at University Heights, said her cash was last known secure at 4 p.m. Jan. 12. The investigation is continuing.

• An arson of building materials valued at $2,000 in 627 Founders Hall was reported at 2:12 a.m. Jan. 24.
The building was last known secure at 2:11 a.m. Jan. 24, police said. The investigation is continuing.

• Under-age consumption of an alcoholic beverage was charged against Britteny Marie Wilson at 11:45 p.m. Feb. 27 at the Dining Hall. Wilson, 20, is a resident of Bulldog Drive.

• Under-age consumption of  an alcoholic beverage was charged against Matthew Keith Price at 1 a.m. Feb. 21 at 311 Miles Hall. Price, 19, is from Burlington.

• A trespassing incident was reported at 12:43 p.m. Feb. 28 at New Hall.
Someone gained entry through a locked door that was not closed properly, police reported. No suspects or property damage were listed.

• Larceny of computer hardware and software — valued at $1,000 — was reported at 7:01 p.m. Feb. 17 after she had temporarily placed it on the ground to unlock her car and came back later to discover it missing from a parking lot at University Heights.
Janet Schuhl, 63, of Alexandria, Va., was listed as the victim. She works for the Peace Corps.