Penn Hills suspect had other gun incidents
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From 1998 to 2003, Ronald Robinson, the Homewood man charged with killing a Penn Hills police officer, was repeatedly accused of wielding firearms on the streets of Pittsburgh and surrounding communities.
In a January 1998 criminal complaint, police said Mr. Robinson choked and punched a woman and then pointed a semi-automatic gun at her. In 2001, he was accused of shooting a man in the leg.
Two years later, according to court records, a pair of witnesses told police that Mr. Robinson fired a gun in the air at Hawkins Village in Rankin.
Yet, in each case, many charges were withdrawn.
Mr. Robinson, 32, faces two counts of homicide in the shooting deaths of police Officer Michael Crawshaw and Danyal Morton Sunday night. He told investigators that he shot and killed Mr. Morton in a house in the 200 block of Johnston Road over a $500 drug debt and then fired at Officer Crawshaw as the officer sat in his patrol car.
At the time of the shooting, Mr. Robinson was on parole for his convictions in the 2001 and 2003 cases. He had been released from prison in 2007 and was wearing an electronic monitoring device on his ankle.
If some of the original charges in those cases had stuck, Mr. Robinson likely would have stayed longer in prison.
Mr. Robinson's criminal history as an adult dates to 1996, when he was 19. He was charged with two counts of simple assault and one count of harassment, but both charges were later withdrawn.
On Jan. 20, 1998, Aisha Smith accused Mr. Robinson of assaulting her and then pointing a gun at her in Larimer. Mr. Robinson would later plead guilty to charges of marijuana possession, drunken driving and driving without a license. According to court records, the assault charge was withdrawn.
Mr. Robinson received a sentence of 30 days of probation in the case and was told to pay $857 in court costs.
The most serious accusations against him came in 2001. On Dec. 16 of that year, according to a criminal complaint, he shot his cousin, Marcus Jernigan, in the ankle on Wheeler Street.
In 2005, Mr. Robinson was convicted on firearms violations and sentenced to 21/2 to 5 years in prison.
But Michael Foglia, his lawyer in the case, said this week that Mr. Robinson had never been charged with shooting Mr. Jernigan and had come to Mr. Jernigan's aid after he was shot by someone else.
The case took several years to reach court because Mr. Jernigan, who was to be a witness for Mr. Robinson, was in prison in Mississippi.
On Oct. 26, 2003, while Mr. Robinson was out on bail on the gun charge, Swissvale police stopped a van carrying him and five other people. He told officers that the group was coming from a party in Rankin. Officers searched the van and found a silver handgun and a small bag containing crack cocaine.
The van's other passengers told police that the gun belonged to Mr. Robinson and he had fired it in the air in Rankin.
He was charged with drug possession, illegal possession of firearms and obliterating the serial number on the handgun found in the van. He was also charged with disorderly conduct and reckless endangerment for shooting the gun.
The district attorney's office later dropped all charges except the one for drug possession after several witnesses repeatedly failed to show up and testify in court or couldn't be found.
Mr. Robinson pleaded guilty to the drug charge in 2005, at the same time he was convicted in the 2001 Homewood shooting case.
Less than a year later, Superintendent Raymond J. Sobina of State Correctional Institution Forest wrote to Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Kevin G. Sasinoski, asking the judge to approve parole for the drug conviction.
"Robinson has remained misconduct-free. His unit housing officers report good overall conduct and positive attitude for this inmate," Mr. Sobina said in the letter on Feb. 21, 2006. "The staff has no objection to parole Mr. Robinson's minimum expiration date."
That date was Aug. 24, 2006. But Mr. Robinson also needed approval from the state parole board because of the gun conviction. He received that on Aug. 26, 2007, although he could have been held until February of next year.
First Published December 9, 2009 12:00 am
