TERRE HAUTE —
Three Terre Haute residents have been arrested for a May 10 gas station robbery for which two teenage boys have been incarcerated since late May.
Drew Ford, 21, Matthew Rigdon, 17, and Kayla King, 18, appeared together in Vigo Superior Court 1 on Friday morning, when a judge found probable cause for their arrests for class-B felony armed robbery.
Meanwhile, Bill Douglas III, 16, and Brody Evans, 18, both have been released from custody and the robbery charges against them have been dismissed.
Detective Charlie Burress of the Terre Haute Police Department told the Tribune-Star that the case has remained active since the arrests of Douglas and Evans because investigators continued to receive information that the wrong suspects had been arrested.
A surveillance video of the robbery was broadcast to the public shortly after the May 10 incident. Douglas and Evans are similar in appearance to the suspects in the video.
“Their own mothers came in and said they did it,” Assistant Chief Shawn Keen said of Douglas and Evans, and the robbery of the Midwest Gas Station in the 1800 block of North Third Street. “I don’t know what motivates someone to do that” when they are innocent, Keen said.
Keen told the Tribune-Star that Douglas and Evans learned about the robbery after friends who saw the surveillance video called the teens and asked if they had committed the robbery because they look like the suspects. The teens soon left Indiana and went to Georgia, where they were later found and agreed to return for questioning by police. After questioning, both Douglas and Evans were charged with armed robbery, a class-B felony which carries a potential prison sentence of 6 to 20 years.
Burress said a tip came to police soon after the arrest of Dougas and Evans that indicated Ford had been involved in the robbery. But police had no other information on Ford, such as his date of birth or a photo, and inquiries at nearby police agencies turned up no information.
Another tip about Ford came in a few weeks later, Burress said, and that time police were told Ford’s address and age, and got a photo that was a match to one of the suspects in the surveillance video taken during the robbery.
“We went to his father’s address, but no one was there, so I left my business card with a message for someone to call me,” Burress said. “Later, I spoke to the dad and stepmom, and asked them to have [Ford] call me. He never did.”
Burress said he learned that Ford did not live at that location, and his parents did not have a phone number or address for him.
A break in the case came this week when two people went to the police station and alerted police to Ford’s address. Ford was located and interviewed by police, who also were told of King and Rigdon’s alleged involvement in the robbery.
During Friday’s court hearing, Burress reported that Ford told police that he, King and Ridgon arrived at the gas station after planning how to commit the robbery during the drive there. While King remained in the vehicle, Burress said, Ford entered the gas station first to look around, and then Rigdon allegedly ran into the building with a baseball bat and started swinging the bat at the store clerk. Ford ripped the cash register from the counter and ran out with Rigdon. The trio then drove to the residence of Ford’s father. After opening the cash register and removing the money, Ford said they threw the cash register into a wooded area off a county road.
Burress said Ford went with officers to the woods, where the cash register was recovered.
In the meantime, other officers located King and Rigdon, and took them to the police station for questioning. Burress said investigators learned that the trio had taken scarves, hats, gloves and the bat from a family member’s home to disguise their identities during the robbery. The suspects told Burress they threw those items from a bridge into a creek after the robbery. Ford and Rigdon also cut their hair after the incident, and one of the suspects got a tattoo on his face in an effort to change his appearance, Burress said.
During questioning, Rigdon also told police that he had robbed the same gas station on a prior occasion, Burress said.
At Friday morning’s hearing, a Tuesday deadline was set for filing of formal charges against Ford, King and Rigdon. Each of their bonds was set at $50,000 with 10 percent allowed, and public defenders were appointed to their cases.
Prosecutor Terry Modesitt and Assistant Chief Keen both commended Detective Burress for continuing the investigation even after the arrests of Evans and Douglas.
“He didn’t give up, I’ll give Charlie that,” Keen said of Burress and the investigation. ““I’m just glad he was pretty thorough. He didn’t give up.”
Modesitt said he did not believe the arrest of Evans and Douglas was due to faulty police work.
“I think if anything, the police should be commended for sticking with it,” Modesitt said of the investigation. “They didn’t drop it after the arrests.”
Lisa Trigg can be reached at (812) 231-4254 or lisa.trigg@tribstar.com.
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