The Dump Known As Redding

The economy must be getting bad if the homeless are being robbed or murdered! These two stories both came from this week’s news. Two homeless men were robbed and one of them was actually murdered by three teenagers that plotted to rob and kill him. What the hell!!!

Homeless man robbed at RV park

By Record Searchlight staff
Originally published 09:03 a.m., April 27, 2009
Updated 09:03 a.m., April 27, 2009

A Missouri man was robbed of several thousand dollars early this morning while he slept at a friend’s at the Sacramento River RV Park in Redding, the Shasta County Sheriff’s Department reported.

Terry Lee Muzzy, 49, a transient, had the money in his wallet form a settlement. He had come to visit friends and had been staying in the RV park about a week when he was robbed, according to a sheriff’s department press release.

Unknown people forcibly took Muzzy’s wallet from him at about 1:30 a.m., the sheriff’s department reported.

Deputies are continuing their investigation.

By Ryan Sabalow
Originally published 11:56 a.m., April 24, 2009
Updated 05:21 p.m., April 24, 2009

Three Redding teens plotted on Saturday to find a homeless man, beat him and take what little he had because “he was an easy target,” police said today.

And after they beat Timothy Lee Alcorn, 48, so severely that he eventually died from his wounds, they went out and robbed another homeless man on the same day Alcorn’s body was found, Redding Police Sgt. Dean Stainberg said this morning at press conference.

Stainberg described Alcorn’s beating as brutal in its ferocity. The three teens, aged 15, 16 and 18, armed themselves with weapons and plotted how they’d carry out their attack, Stainberg said.

Two of the boys hid, while the third went down to speak with Alcorn in a wooded area behind Masonic Avenue. When Alcorn’s attention was diverted, the other two hit him from behind, Stainberg said.

“The beating was savage,” Stainberg said.

The teens dragged their unconscious victim under a bush and left him, Stainberg said.

Alcorn later regained consciousness and was spotted about 10:30 p.m. Saturday by a man on nearby Lake Boulevard, who called police. The witness, Ryon McCullough, 29, said he asked Alcorn, who appeared drunk and covered in blood, if he was OK.

McCullough called 911 and two officers were sent to the area, but they couldn’t find Alcorn, Stainberg said.

The next day, after Alcorn was reported missing, investigators found two blood spots in the area, but they couldn’t locate the victim. On Monday, a friend of Alcorn’s family, 51-year-old Tom Smitherman of Shasta Lake, found the body and called police.

Stainberg declined to reveal what weapons the teens allegedly used in the attack. He also declined to reveal what the teens allegedly took from Alcorn.

The trio later admitted to investigators that they robbed another homeless man on Monday in the same homeless encampment behind Masonic Avenue, Stainberg said.

The victim in that case hasn’t come forward, Stainberg said.

Anyone with information on the alleged beating and the robbery is asked to call Redding police investigators at 225-4211.

On Thursday afternoon, the two younger boys were arrested at the Redding Library. The 18-year-old, Albert Curtis Sanchez, was arrested around 6 p.m. at a West Street apartment.

Each of the boys likely faces charges of murder, robbery and kidnapping. They’re likely to be arraigned on Monday afternoon, said Shasta County District Attorney Jerry Benito.

Prosecutors are still trying to determine whether the two juveniles will be identified and tried in adult court, Benito said.

Benito hinted that the teens likely would be tried as adults, saying at the press conference that his office has a history of prosecuting teens as adults in past murder cases.

“The impact on the victim and the victim’s family is the same whether the perpetrator is 17, 15, 16, or 18,” Benito said.

Alcorn’s mother and father said at the press conference that the death of their son was senseless, and they wept in front of reporters while they described his life.

Hershel Alcorn said before breaking down in tears that his son often gave away his food stamps to families who were worse off than he was.

Timothy Alcorn’s mother, Charlayne, said that though her son fought a battle with alcohol, he remained a good Christian all his life.

“It’s horrible for us to go through this,” she said. “There’s no rhyme or reason for it.”

Redding Police Capt. Paul Grooms said Saturday’s beating reminds him of case he investigated back in 1994 involving a year-old, unsolved beating death of a homeless man.

Paul Edward Jordan, then 28, was driving around in a pickup truck with two teens when he came upon a “bum” dozing in a sleeping bag, under a railroad trestle in south Redding.

They stopped and Jordan got out of the truck. He picked up a large stick out of a nearby fire pit, hit Steven George Atchison, the 44-year-old transient, several times and then got back in the truck and drove off.

Atchison died from the head injuries, and was later found dead, still in the bag, by passersby.

The case went unsolved for more than a year. A tip led Grooms to Jordan, who eventually pleaded guilty to second degree murder and was sentenced to 16 years- to- life in prison.

Grooms said Jordan didn’t like homeless people in the area and he picked Atchison to attack because he was vulnerable.