Woman charged with stealing stolen money

Posted 1/8/13

Shawnna L. Hernandez, 33, is charged with receiving more than $1,000 of stolen property, a felony, and misdemeanor counts of intereference with a peace officer and larceny. Hernandez was arrested Friday afternoon by Powell police, and her bond was …

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Woman charged with stealing stolen money

Posted

A Powell woman has been charged with stealing more than $1,400 that previoulsy was stolen during a Dec. 11 armed robbery on Queens Boulevard.

Shawnna L. Hernandez, 33, is charged with receiving more than $1,000 of stolen property, a felony, and misdemeanor counts of intereference with a peace officer and larceny. Hernandez was arrested Friday afternoon by Powell police, and her bond was set at $2,000 cash or surety during a Monday appearance in Circuit Court in Cody.

Hernandez is alleged to have taken the $1,460 in stolen cash from the home of her neighbors, Obie and Tori Phillips. The Phillipses, along with Michael L. C. Guzman, 29, and Cory Berisko, 22, are charged in connection with the Dec. 11 robbery. Obie Phillips, 38, allegedly went into the Queens Boulevard home with a stolen handgun and robbed the two occupants — firing a shot in the process — while Tori Phillips, 30, and Guzman acted as lookouts, Powell police say. Berisko allegedly gave Obie Phillips information about the home and its occupants beforehand, while playing no role in the theft itself.

Police seized a couple items connected to the robbery — including the handgun allegedly used by Obie Phillips and a shotgun stolen from the Queens Boulevard trailer — at the Phillipses’ East Adams Street home, but did not find the stolen money.

On Dec. 31, however, Tori Phillips contacted police from jail to say the cash could be found in a bag in the bedroom of her home, says an affidavit from Powell Police Investigator Mike Hall. Tori Phillips added that Hernandez had been asked to retrieve the bag for the Phillipses.

Hall says Hernandez initially lied to him, leading to the interference charge. Ultimately, however, Hall says she admitted to finding $1,460 worth of $20 bills in a blue bag in the Phillipses home.

“Hernandez said she was ‘surprised’ that we (police) didn’t find the money before,” Hall said.

Based on what she’d read about the robbery in the newspaper, Hall said Hernandez believed the money was from the robbery.

“Hernandez said she put the money in her locked box hoping that Tori and Obie (Phillips) would get sent to prison and she could just claim the money as hers and convert it to her own,” Hall wrote. “Hernandez agreed that she should have called us when she found the money but she wanted the money, so she didn’t.”

Hernandez turned over the envelope of bills and said she had spent none of it, Hall said. Police have said the man who was robbed reported about $3,300 as stolen. Guzman previously told police he believed there was about $2,000 taken, court records say.

Hernandez also admitted to stealing a dresser and entertainment center from the Phillipses home — items worth about $50 that actually belonged to the landlord — and giving them to a friend, Hall said. That allegation makes up the misdemeanor count of larceny.

Hernandez, a mother of two, had been caring for the Phillipses 13-year-old and 9-year-old daughters since the couple’s arrests, but said in court on Monday that she was no longer their caretaker.

In setting Hernandez’s bond at $2,000 cash or surety, Circuit Court Judge Bruce Waters said he believed her risk of fleeing or posing a danger to the community was “fairly minimal.” Hernandez is a Park County native and never committed a crime outside of speeding tickets.

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