Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 21, 1991 TAG: 9103210416
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-3 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
A 15-count indictment alleged that Thomas William Robinson, Tina Marie Payne O'Meara and Jerry Lee Brewer planned the robberies just before Robinson was released on parole from state prison last December.
The three were arrested in Lynchburg on March 1 in the parking lot of Brewer's apartment complex. Brewer and Robinson had more than $9,600 in cash with them, allegedly proceeds of a bank robbery hours before in Greensboro, N.C.
The indictment specifically charges them with four of a recent string of six bank robberies in Roanoke, Bedford and Lynchburg. The trio also is accused of robbing banks in Greensboro and Myrtle Beach, S.C., and with robbing a Pizza Inn restaurant in Greensboro, a Pizza Hut restaurant in Greensboro and a Red Lobster restaurant in Roanoke.
The robberies - committed between Jan. 11 and March 1 - are believed to have brought the three a total of $75,500.
Brewer, 35, faces a maximum 100 years in prison, a fine of $1 million or both, if convicted on all counts. O'Meara, 33, could face a total of 105 years in prison, a fine of $1.25 million or both.
But Robinson, with convictions in three violent felonies, faces the stiffest penalty of the three. If convicted on all counts, he could get 105 years in prison.
He faces an additional mandatory minimum sentence of five years for each instance he is alleged to have carried a firearm during a robbery and a minimum of 15 years on each of five counts that allege he possessed a firearm.
That means Robinson, 36, faces about 100 years of mandatory prison time to be served after the sentence he receives, if any, for the robberies themselves, government prosecutors say.
The trio also faces federal charges in the Middle District of North Carolina for the March 1 robbery of the Greensboro bank.
A trial has been scheduled to begin May 13.
by CNB