Robber who used toy gun could get sentencing break
By Heather Nann Collins, Journal Inquirer
06/20/2006
A Jamaican man who used a toy gun to rob two people and attempt to rob a third will spend as little as four years in prison.
The man, Kenneth Lowe, 42, was convicted of two counts of robbery and one count of attempted robbery in a plea deal Monday in Hartford Superior Court.
Acknowledging that the sentence is "low" - under the deal, Lowe will get between four and five years in prison, a fraction of the 60 years he could've gotten - Judge Thomas P. Miano said he was influenced by a psychological report prepared for the court.
Prosecutor Richard Rubino said the state felt a seven-year jail term was more appropriate.
In shaping the deal, Miano said he considered Lowe's lack of a criminal record and the elements of the psychological report, which wasn't available to the public.
Lowe, who moved to Connecticut 23 years ago from Jamaica, will be sentenced on June 30.
Lowe also must serve five years of probation and, because of the felony convictions, could face deportation to Jamaica if he isn't an American citizen.
According to Rubino, Lowe, brandishing the "gun," approached a man in the driveway of his Windbrook Drive home in Windsor on Nov. 6, 2004. The resident spotted the weapon and took off in his car, driving to the police station.
Minutes later, an employee of Kimberly Hall in Windsor said Lowe put the gun in her side as she was leaving work and demanded money, then fled in a late model Kia with a broken window.
The next day, Lowe was in East Windsor, where, again using the toy gun, he robbed a woman in the driveway of her home.
Lowe was caught a day later, after an off-duty East Windsor police officer recognized the stolen Kia from a bulletin.
©Journal Inquirer 2006
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