16-year-old scheduled to plead guilty to robbery charges
Defense attorney Mark F. Morrison said Monday that 16-year-old Antonio Lanko, accused of participating in a robbery that resulted in a man’s death, will plead guilty this week in Fayette County Court. The teen did not appear in court Monday afternoon, but Morrison asked Judge John F. Wagner to schedule a plea date.
District Attorney Nancy D. Vernon offered Lanko one to two years in prison on two separate robbery cases during what was supposed to be a juvenile transfer hearing on Oct. 15. At the time, neither Lanko nor his attorneys made a move to accept the plea offer.
Morrison represents Lanko in an alleged Dec. 29 robbery at a Lemon Wood Acres apartment. During that alleged robbery, Lanko and two other men reportedly pointed guns at the occupants and demanded money. One of the participants in the robbery, Charles Lendell, was shot and killed by James Simon Thompson. He was not charged criminally because state police ruled the shooting was in self-defense.
Lanko and David Sims, however, were charged since police believed the robbery was the impetus for Lendell’s death. Sims has already pleaded guilty in that case and the homicide charge was dropped against Lanko.
In the second case, attorney Patrick McDaniel, whom Morrison said agreed to the plea, represents Lanko.
In that case, Uniontown police allege that Lanko held a .22-caliber gun to a city man’s head last Nov. 8 after asking him if he wanted to buy drugs. Lanko then allegedly robbed Kenneth Stimmel of $300 and police said he later confessed to the robbery.
Lanko had been free on bond in those two cases, but after he was charged with participating in the robbery of an Ohio couple who mistakenly drove into Bierer Wood Acres over the summer, that bond was revoked.
Wagner scheduled Lanko’s plea for Thursday.