Home invasion robberies on the rise in Redlands

REDLANDS — One day after a suspect was taken into custody in relation to a small series of home invasion robberies, another such robbery has police looking for different suspects.

Erik Dewayne Howard, 21, a parolee and known gang member, was arrested May 26 for a home invasion robbery in which he allegedly broke into the apartment of a 75-year-old woman five days earlier and stole home electronics, cash and the victim’s debit card.

The suspect was recorded on a convenience store video surveillance system trying to use the victim’s debit card. He was arrested at the corner of Tribune and Sun in Redlands by the police department’s Multiple Enforcement Task Force.

One day later, an older couple was victimized on Terracina Boulevard after answering a knock at the front door. When a woman in her late 60s opened the door, two black males in their early 20s forced their way into the home. The female resident and a man in his late 70s who also was at the house were bound while the suspects ransacked the home. The suspects took an Airsoft pistol, cash and other items.

This makes three home invasion robberies over a 16-day span, between May 12-27.

“(Last year), we had 11 home invasion robberies,” said Redlands police spokesman Carl Baker. “So far in 2010, we have had (seven).”

Still unsolved is a May 12 robbery in which a 60-year-old man was victimized by a woman and four suspects. The man was assaulted with a blunt weapon.

In the May 21 invasion for which Howard was arrested, reports were that he entered the female victim’s unlocked apartment on Hibiscus Drive, threatened her with a handgun and made off with the items.

When Howard, who is a transient, was arrested, police located items stolen during the robbery, including locating an Airsoft gun believed to be have been used during the crime.

Howard was booked into Central Detention Center in San Bernardino.