The best and worst of Triad area police blotters, as compiled by Jordan Green
Poisoned coffee
Winston-Salem police reportedly received information indicating Stephanie Matlock, 26, and Curtis Goins, 17, were attempting to poison 46-year-old Tatshiana Mehaffey by secretly placing narcotics in her coffee during a visit to Mehaffey’s home on Peachtree Street at 10:25 p.m. on Sept. 9. Goins is identified as Mehaffey’s nephew, and Matlock as a friend of the family. Following an investigation by detectives, Matlock and Goins were charged with attempted first-degree murder, and held in Forsyth County Jail under a $200,000 secured bond. A trial date has been set for Sept. 25.
Cash register in the woods
An unidentified white man robbed Tito’s Italian Restaurant on High Point Road in Greensboro with a knife in the early morning hours of Sept. 12. The Greensboro police said he took the cash register and fled on foot into a wooded area off Florida Street. Witnesses saw a second man, later identified as 25-year-old Robert Joseph Hanson, who was also with the cash register in the woods. The two men reportedly ran into a house on West Florida Street. Police entered the house and located the cash register and Hanson, but the thief eluded arrest.
Rampage from Wal-Mart
An unidentified white man wearing a blue T-shirt and blue jeans eluded Winston-Salem police in a chase that involved two stolen vehicles. The chase was initiated after 46-year-old Truella Sue Palmer of Pilot Mountain reported that the suspect entered her 2001 Ford Windstar van from the passenger side while she was getting into her vehicle in the parking lot of a Wal-Mart store on Hanes Mill Road. The man reportedly flashed a handgun and ordered her to drive. Palmer struggled with him, and then got out of the van, at which point the man drove away, colliding with several other vehicles as he left the parking lot. Police officers canvassed the area and located the van abandoned behind a house on Whittier Street. K-9 officers tracking the suspect saw him enter a house on Oak Summit Road, where he stole a 2002 Buick Century owned by resident Betty Stoltz, 86, by driving it through a closed garage door. The chase ensued once more, but officers lost sight of the suspect in the area of Ogburn Avenue and Kapp Street.
Ah-ha moment
A Greensboro police officer arriving at the Home Barber Shop on South Elm- Eugene Street in response to a burglar alarm in the early morning hours of Sept. 7 found Joseph Eugene Collier, 32, on the north side of the building with bulges in his pants pockets. After a search, the officer reportedly found tools in Collier’s pockets, including a meat cleaver with a piece missing from it. When assisting officers arrived they found fresh tool marks on the back door of the barber shop, along with the missing piece from the meat cleaver. Collier was arrested and charged with attempted burglary, possession of burglary tools, and also charged with burglary from a separate incident.
