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Alleged 'Shopping Cart Killer' trial begins in Harrisonburg

Anthony Eugene Robinson is led into the Rockingham County Circuit Court at the start of the trial Monday.
Daniel Lin/Daily News-Record/Pool Photo
Anthony Eugene Robinson is led into the Rockingham County Circuit Court at the start of the trial Monday.

The trial of a man accused of murdering two women in Harrisonburg began on Monday. WMRA's Randi B. Hagi attended the proceedings and filed this report.

Anthony Eugene Robinson was arrested in late 2021 on suspicion of murdering Allene "Beth" Redmon of Harrisonburg, and Tonita Lorice Smith, of Charlottesville. He has also been tied to two other women's deaths in Fairfax County and one in Washington, D.C.

Jury selection took up over half the proceedings on Monday, with several potential jurors being eliminated from the pool because they had already made their mind up about the defendant's guilt, they believed a first degree murder conviction should automatically garner a life sentence, or they could not handle graphic photos or discussions.

After the jury was impaneled, Robinson's attorney, Louis Nagy, moved for a mistrial, saying his client was entitled to a jury of his peers, but the jury pool was almost entirely white. Robinson is Black. The deceased women, Redmon and Smith, were white and Black, respectively. Commonwealth's Attorney Marsha Garst argued that the jury pool was selected randomly and fairly from local residents registered with the Department of Motor Vehicles. Judge Bruce D. Albertson denied the mistrial motion.

In her opening statement, Garst said "Beth and Tonita entered the gates of hell" when they visited Robinson's Howard Johnson motel room separately in October and November of 2021. "He kills women for sport," she accused. Nagy acknowledged that the case "looks bad" for his client, but argued the prosecution does not know exactly how the women died or what happened in room 336.

Harrisonburg Police Detective Randall Life answers questions on the witness stand as Rockingham County Commonwealth's Attorney Marsha Garst presents a photo of a shopping cart allegedly used by Anthony Eugene Robinson to transport a body away from the Howard Johnson motel on Linda Lane in Harrisonburg.
Daniel Lin/Daily News-Record/Pool Photo
Harrisonburg Police Detective Randall Life answers questions on the witness stand as Rockingham County Commonwealth's Attorney Marsha Garst presents a photo of a shopping cart allegedly used by Anthony Eugene Robinson to transport a body away from the Howard Johnson motel on Linda Lane in Harrisonburg.

Garst called several witnesses on Monday, including relatives of the deceased. She spent most of her time questioning Detective Randall Life with the Harrisonburg Police Department – including about surveillance camera footage showing Redmon and Smith each entering Robinson's motel room but never walking out. After each woman visits, Robinson can later be seen removing something shaped like a body, wrapped or draped in white sheets, in a shopping cart.

During the showing of this footage, Smith's brother jumped up and yelled at the defendant. Judge Albertson sentenced him to 10 days in jail for contempt of court. The defense then moved for a mistrial again, saying the outburst suggested Robinson's guilt to the jury. The judge denied the motion and told the jury to disregard the incident. Garst concluded the day by introducing dozens of photos taken in the empty lot behind the motel, which showed Smith and Redmon's bodies wrapped in white sheets as they were discovered by police that November.

The trial is expected to last through the end of the week and could extend into the next.

Editor's note, Jan. 31 — on Thursday of this week, Albertson informed the attorneys that the jury pool is typically selected from voter rolls, rather than the Department of Motor Vehicles.

Randi B. Hagi first joined the WMRA team in 2019 as a freelance reporter. Her work has been featured on NPR and other NPR member stations; in The Harrisonburg Citizen, where she previously served as the assistant editor;The Mennonite; Mennonite World Review; and Eastern Mennonite University's Crossroads magazine.
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