Arrests made in strip-search robbery

Three Waynesboro men accused of forcing a fourth to strip naked in the street before they robbed him of cash were arrested Thursday following police searches inside the troubled 260 N. Commerce Ave. apartment complex.

Waynesboro police Sgt. Kelly Walker said two men were at the apartment building Aug. 24 to buy crack cocaine when one was accused of being a police informant.

That man, 20, tried to leave, but was pulled out the window of a pickup truck and ordered to strip naked at gunpoint, Walker said. After redressing, he was robbed of more than $200.

Darnell Eugene Reynolds, 24; Paul David Foster, 43; and Calvin M. Smith, 33, were charged Thursday with robbery and use of a firearm in commission of a felony. They are being held without bond at Middle River Regional Jail in Verona.

Walker said detectives worked the case to little success because witnesses and the victim “weren’t forthcoming with the information.”

Police searched apartments 201 and 208 at about 4 a.m. Thursday. Details on what authorities found were unavailable. One suspect was arrested at that time. The other arrests followed in the day, including one in Nelson County, Walker said.

Court records show Reynolds convicted of multiple DWIs and hit-and-runs, as well as assault and public drunkness charges; Foster of disorderly conduct, obstructing justice and public drunkness; Smith of petty larceny, public drunkness and at least two DWIs.

It was the second violent crime this week at the apartment building. Two days earlier, a woman was charged with beating another with a baseball bat.
A June review of police reports by The News Virginian found officers responded almost daily to the apartment building, which was on pace for a record-setting 289 incidents this year.

In response to a pair of fights that hospitalized two men in late 2008, the building’s owner instituted new rules for tenants and visitors, which had some success in deterring crime, residents said.