Stay away or face jail, teen hears

Suspect seen near victim’s residence

Go near the North Little Rock home of the woman he's accused of robbing and he'll go back to jail to wait to stand trial, a Pulaski County circuit judge warned a teenage defendant on Wednesday.

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Judge Leon Johnson agreed to release 18-year-old Anthony Ray White III on Wednesday after he spent a week in jail over complaints from prosecutors that he had been seen as recently as last week near the Gardenia Avenue home of 44-year-old Tonya Rochell Foster.

Deputy prosecutor John Hout said White's being so close to Foster's home violated the judge's April order that bars the defendant from having any contact with Foster while he's awaiting his March trial on aggravated-robbery and theft charges.

White's behavior could be considered threatening, the prosecutor told the judge, who agreed.

"You have no business over there," the judge told White. "I think you know this could be considered a threat."

Foster and neighbor Karen Hogan told the judge Wednesday that they had each seen White either driving a green Lincoln down the street or visiting neighboring homes on Gardenia in the past two weeks.

Questioned by defense attorney Peggy Egan, the women said White never acted menacingly and never tried to talk or communicate with them. The women agreed that he seemed to be socializing with people who lived on Gardenia near Foster.

White is accused of being the gunman who robbed Foster in her front yard in January as her 10-year-old son watched.

According to police reports, White saw Foster cash a check at the A to Z gas station on East Broadway in North Little Rock.

With co-defendant Cordale Kent McDaniel, 27, driving, White followed Foster home, accosting her with a pistol and taking her purse as soon as she parked in her driveway, the prosecutor told the judge on Wednesday.

When White got into a car to leave, Foster, on the phone with police dispatchers, followed the vehicle and saw one occupant get out and run away on Boggs Street. She kept following the car until it reached the 8700 block of Fourche Dam Pike in Little Rock, where police caught up and arrested McDaniel, according to police report.

White was arrested two months later and subsequently released from jail after posting bail.

Prosecutors petitioned the judge to have him rearrested on Sept. 24. He was arrested again on Oct. 1.

Metro on 10/08/2015

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