TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Burglary Suspect Arrested In Holiday Garden Estates

ADVERTISEMENT

By LISA A. DAVIS

The Tampa Tribune

Published: August 16, 2008

  Kevin Rigby

NEW PORT RICHEY - Deputies arrested a home invasion suspect not far from his own home Friday.

Members of the Pasco County Sheriff's Office Special Tactical Operations and Patrol Unit responded to a call early Friday morning of a home-invasion robbery and soon after saw a man matching the suspect's description walking down Dahlia Avenue.

"The units passed by the individual and there was no real reaction from him because they were unmarked units," Lt. Timothy Powers said.

That's when deputies went after him, taking him to the ground, Powers said. The man didn't resist. Instead, Kevin Hayward Rigby immediately told deputies he had a gun and they removed it from his waistband, the lieutenant said.

Rigby, according to his arrest report, also was carrying flashlights, gloves, a mask, a screwdriver, pliers and a box cutter.

After deputies read him his legal rights, Rigby, 29, told them he had just committed two burglaries on the two streets behind his house at 5836 Dahlia Ave., the report states.

"He was a couple of houses down, almost home," Powers said.

In one of the robberies about 3:15 a.m. Friday, sheriff's officials say, a burglar cut a screen door to a garage on Embay Avenue to get inside, then got into the home through an unlocked kitchen door. The burglar walked into a bedroom and woke up a man by shining a flashlight into his eyes, sheriff's office spokesman Doug Tobin said. The burglar asked for money and when he got it, ran out of the home.

"Who wants to wake up in the middle of the night and have someone standing over them?" Powers said.

Rigby was arrested at 6:40 a.m. on charges of being a felon in possession of a firearm, possession of burglary tools and carrying a concealed weapon. He has not been charged with home-invasion robbery but is suspected in as many as seven invasions in the past 10 days, Powers said.

On Thursday, Pasco detectives had noticed a pattern of home-invasion robberies in the southwest area of the county and called Powers of the special tactical operations unit, who in turn sent unit members to the area early Friday to patrol. They were nearby when they got the call about a suspect.

The recent home invasions, mostly in Holiday, Powers said, tend to occur overnight and the intruder quickly takes small items such as jewelry, credit cards, money and prescription drugs. No serious injures have been reported.

Just before 7 a.m. Wednesday, a 78-year-old woman who lives in Holiday Garden Estates, the same subdivision as Rigby, reported to deputies she confronted a burglar inside her home. The man broke into her house by removing a jalousie window and unlocking the deadbolt to the back door.

A man, described as 20 to 30 years old, pointed a gun at the woman, demanded she give him cash and then he stole her wallet and hydrocodone, a report states.

She wasn't hurt.

Detectives are investigating Rigby and other home-invasion robberies in the area. They expect more charges to be filed against him.

This year, Rigby was convicted of possessing narcotics, burglary and misdemeanor driving under the influence, records show. He is on drug offender probation until November 2009, Florida Department of Corrections records show.

Reporter Lisa A. Davis can be reached at (727) 815-1083 or ldavis@tampatrib.com.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT