WEBSTER GROVES, Mo. – A mysterious hooded man on a moped was released from jail earlier this year after being charged with similar crimes in a different suburb, according to police.
Now locked up on no bond, the suspect left a sparse trail that took savvy detective work and cutting-edge tech.
The suspect, who was recently featured in a news report this month, was wanted for alleged bizarre crimes such as alleged assaults on random women in upscale areas. The most recent example was in the Cyrano’s Cafe parking lot on July 10, when the suspect reportedly rode in yelling about circumcision before grabbing a woman.
“She actually threw a bottle of wine at the suspect and was able to push herself away,” Webster Groves Police Lt. Jillian McCoy said. “This was a moped. It did not have a license plate on it.”
Resident Donna Kriete vividly remembers being near where it happened and finding out later.
“I was coming home that night and I actually saw the guy on the moped, but I just thought it was some guy riding along,” she said. “Then when I heard about it, I became concerned because I don’t live that far from where the incident happened.”
Police checked the Flock camera system, which not only reads license plates, but also compiles vehicle descriptions. They started with key words “lime green moped.”
“What they found was nothing, so they started down to the bare bones of everything and they were able to just put in ‘bike,’ and hours upon hours of hours of investigation, detectives were able to finally locate this individual in multiple areas of our city,” McCoy said.
Police identified Robert Merritt, 28, who’s now locked up without bond. Authorities are asking for his booking photo to be shown out of concern that there could be more victims.
FOX 2 has learned Merritt, who’s charged with first-degree felony sex abuse in the Webster Groves case, was released from jail earlier this year in an eerily similar Kirkwood case from February.
A Kirkwood police officer reported in a court-filed probable cause statement that the defendant “traveled on a moped,” “approached three separate females,” “all unknown to each other,” and reportedly assaulted them. The court document adds, “…defendant has a criminal history out of Colorado for menacing assault.”
“This seems to be a repeated pattern with this individual, so if there are other victims, we do want to be able to have those individuals that are victims of crimes of this person to come forward and to talk to us,” Lt. McCoy said.
Court records show the defendant was able to pay $175 to bond out after the February charges, which were misdemeanor assaults. This time around, Merritt is being held on no bond for the felony sex abuse charge.
