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Alert resident leads police
to robbery suspect
By LINDA N. WELLER
The Telegraph
ALTON - The vigilance of a Central Avenue resident paid off Thursday when he snapped pictures of a man who only a minute later attacked a woman and took her purse.
The photos, and James Meisenheimer's own eyes, helped police capture an 18-year-old suspect shortly after the mugging. The incident prompted police to spend much of Friday afternoon looking for evidence to connect the man to other cases. The man has not yet been charged.
Police executed search warrants on two residences Friday, one in the 1400 block of Maupin Street and another on East Seventh Street.
"We are attempting to get evidence against him for other crimes that we believe he may be involved in," Police Chief Chris Sullivan said.
Meisenheimer, 76, said the suspect had been acting suspiciously near his house for a couple weeks. He decided to snap his picture, just in case.
"I opened the door and got a picture of him for the police," Meisenheimer said. Moments later, he saw the man knock down the woman. He then called 911 and rushed to her aid.
Four patrol cars showed up.
"I get good response when I call," he said.
"Jim Meisenheimer took pictures that were a pretty good identification," Sullivan said.
The man only had fled about a block away to Garden Street when police arrested him. He had shed his shirt and coat in the meantime.
Victim Rebecca Doyle, 53, of Alton, said she was visiting her 85-year-old mother, Dorothy Embry, who lives with Meisenheimer, when she was attacked at about 10:30 a.m.
"I got out of my car in front of the house," Doyle said. "The man was walking the other way, then (quickly) turned around, grabbed my arm and pulled me down. I fell on the sidewalk."
The man ran off with her purse, which contained only 35 cents, keys, a driver's license and a bottle of prescription medication.
A few hours later, Doyle's reddened hand was swelling, she was scratched and bruises began to appear.
"People should be careful, I'll never carry another purse," Doyle said.
She said she is just happy she wasn't hurt any worse than she was, and that the mugger hadn't knocked down her mother. Police recovered the purse and the suspect's jacket.
The suspect was not charged as of Friday.
"We'll have a probably cause hearing over the weekend and charge him on Monday," Sullivan said.
Meisenheimer, who is involved in the city's Weed and Seed neighborhood revitalization strategy, goes to the group's meetings and tips off authorities about suspicious actions or code violations on his street. The suspect on Thursday fed his concern.
"Every day he was loitering in that vacant lot, looking in buildings and cars," he said. "He was also throwing stuff in the vacant lot. I've been suspicious of him for two weeks. He was spending too much time gawking."
At one neighborhood meeting, Meisenheimer complained about renters tossing buckets of human waste out of an upstairs window, probably because the house had no water service.
He said he has watched the neighborhood decline from the two-story, frame home where he has lived for 37 years. Instead of moving, he chooses to stay put and fight crime by being the eyes, ears and police-caller on his block.
"It's a hard time to stay on Central Avenue," he said. "Everybody else is scared."
The retiree knows his street, who lives there - and most importantly - who doesn't.
"Everybody within a 20 block area knows Jim, and not one of them knows a police officer's name," he said.
He has two live-feed cameras poised on the front of his house and watches his car parked on the street and his front yard on the screen of a small, white plastic television set in his living room.
His camera is ready for him to grab and take pictures of suspicious people or criminal activities. He said he also has a Taser stun gun for self-defense.
Meisenheimer believes he was attacked a block from his home on Nov. 9 because of his anti-crime actions. Two men knocked him down by Central Package Liquor, 1303 Central Ave., but did not try to rob him.
The following suspects were charged with aggravated battery, a felony, and had bonds of $50,000 - Frederick Mason, 23, of the first block of Elm Street in Alton; and Joshua Wade, 18, of the 1300 block of Garden Street.
Meisenheimer said he has replaced 40 windows over the years because of vandalism, and someone broke out windows of Embry's car.
Sullivan said police believe Taylor moved to Alton in December or early January, after being let out of prison in Texas. They already had some contact with him, including issuing a traffic ticket, citation for standing in the street and charge of resisting police.
Meisenheimer said he wants the city's Weed and Seed program to continue - and strengthened. The director's salary is not in Alton's fiscal year 2008-09 budget, but Sullivan is trying to fund it with donations and drug seizure money.
He also wants more foot patrols and for the police bike patrols to resume.
"People in our neighborhood need to see police officers in something besides a car going by," he said. "The Nuisance Abatement Task Force is only one day a month. Weed and Seed isn't being enforced the way it was meant to be. Police officers need to be on the street more."
Sullivan said he has increased foot patrols in the past couple of years, including on Central Avenue.
"We have been doing hundreds and hundreds of them since last year when we put it in various places all over town," Sullivan said, particularly the 1100 to 1300 blocks of Central. "We evaluate them on a monthly basis."
March 18, 2008
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Taylor------Stewart------Phillips
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Alton man helps police break cases
By LINDA N. WELLER
The Telegraph
ALTON - The man who snapped a photo of an alleged purse-snatcher last week led to charges in that case and also helped authorities break at least two others, police said Monday.
"I give him full credit for this case," said Lt. David Hayes, chief of detectives at the Alton Police Department, about James Meisenheimer, 76, of the 1200 block of Central Avenue. "Working backwards, it helped us solve these other cases."
Hayes said police still are investigating other crimes that the suspect may have committed since he moved to Alton in December or January after being released from prison in Texas.
Neither Hayes nor Police Chief Chris Sullivan could say why the suspect, Sonny Dion Taylor, 18, of the 1100 block of East Seventh Street in Alton, moved to the city.
On Monday, the Madison County State's Attorney's Office charged Taylor with robbery for the Thursday incident.
Meisenheimer said he does not think he is a hero for helping police.
"I don't feel like a hero. I feel like someone who stepped forward and did what I should, and what my neighbors should be doing," he said. "I hope it will encourage others.
"That's great that there was more than what happened here," he said about other crimes police say they connected to Taylor.
Meisenheimer said he would continue being a watchdog for "his" portion of Central Avenue.
"I'll do it until they wipe me out," he said.
The authorities also charged Taylor and Anthony L.D. Stewart, 17, of the 1400 block of Maupin Street, with armed robbery in the Jan. 18 holdup at gunpoint of a Papa John's deliveryman in the 1300 block of Highland Avenue. The robbers got away with a pizza and the man's wallet, containing $200, the victim's driver's license and a credit card.
An Alton Police Department report says the 22-year-old driver arrived at the order address to see a black man about 5 feet 10 inches tall and wearing a large, heavyweight coat. The man directed the deliveryman to the rear of the house, where a second black man of about the same height and who also wore a heavy coat was waiting, the report says.
Both men then pulled guns on the Papa John's employee, with one of them saying, "You know what this is."
He ordered the deliveryman to turn his face away from the robbers and empty his pockets. The deliveryman handed over his cell phone and his wallet, with the robbers running east toward Highland, the report says.
The victim said he heard a car door open, then close. He told police that he had left the car keys in the ignition, and the robbers had removed them, throwing them down on the sidewalk about 75 feet from the car. The victim surmised that the robbers threw his keys away so he could not drive after them as they escaped.
The State's Attorney's Office also charged Taylor and Stewart with theft from a person after they allegedly entered a woman's vehicle on Jan. 24 on East Fifth Street. The men stole a purse from the woman while she was inside the vehicle, authorities said.
A judge set bond for Taylor of $30,000 on the theft charge, and $100,000 each on the robbery and armed robbery charges. Bond for Stewart was set at $30,000 on the theft charge and $100,000 on the armed robbery charge.
On Thursday morning, Meisenheimer took photos of a man who he thought had acted suspiciously for the past two weeks on his street. About a minute later, the man allegedly knocked down the 53-year-old daughter of his companion and took her purse.
The purse only contained 35 cents, the woman's driver's license and prescription medicine. She suffered bruises, scrapes and a swollen hand.
The description that Meisenheimer and the victim gave, bolstered by the photograph, led police to the suspect. They arrested him a block away and recovered the Alton woman's purse.
On Friday, police executed search warrants for the apartment in the 1100 block of East Seventh Street in Alton, where Taylor was staying, and at Stewart's home in the 1400 block of Maupin Street. Stewart was arrested shortly after the search warrant was executed at his home.
Hayes said police recovered evidence related to the crimes, and also found cannabis at the Seventh Street residence. That led to charges being filed against a third man, Cedric J. Phillips, 20, who police said lived at the residence and had been allowing Taylor to stay there.
"When we executed the search warrant there, Phillips was present and was found to have 15 bags of cannabis in his possession, and several hundred dollars was found in the residence," Hayes said.
He said the address in the 1100 block of East Seventh Street had been "the focus of (police) attention of suspected drug activity for awhile.
"We have been particularly interested in that residence," Hayes said. "It sits right behind Hellrung Park. Our Nuisance Abatement Task Force was just up there Wednesday, dealing with a pit bull and some other nuisance-related issues."
Phillips was charged with unlawful possession of cannabis with intent to deliver for allegedly having more than 30 but not more than 500 grams of a substance containing cannabis, authorities said.
Hayes said it appears Taylor moved to Alton after being released from prison in Texas and had an affiliation with Phillips.
Telegraph assistant city editor Steve Whitworth contributed some information for this article.
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