An amputee man was severely beaten and left for dead in Gaston County, North Carolina. The burglars stole his wallet, car, and even his prosthetic leg.
The victim is named Aaron Sanders. According to a captain with the Gaston County Police, Curtis Rosselle, stated the burglars tied up Sanders, and proceeded to utilize a Taser-like device on him, and then savagely beaten him with a baseball bat and a machete. When the attackers assumed he had died, they covered his body and left his cell phone, two vehicle titles, a welding machine, his wallet with $600 and his white Jeep Cherokee.
More astonishing, the burglars also took his titanium prosthetic leg.
A not so passional crime
The Gaston County Police quickly made three arrests. Two suspects have been publicly identified. These suspects are Holly Dawn Mesker, aged 32, of 602 Fieldcrest Place in Stanley, and her ex-husband, Patrick Wayne Christopher, aged 43, of Newton.
Mesker lived with Sanders, and on Friday, she was placed on domestic violence hold. This is why Roselle believes it is mainly a crime of passion.
The three attackers first brutally beat Sanders as retaliation for the argument he had with Mesker that led to the domestic violence hold. Rosselle believes that when the burglars finished the beating, is when they realize they could get “more” from the assault, and decided to steal the victim’s property.
On his personal Facebook page, Sanders claimed his prosthetic leg was treated as a “souvenir” which adds reliability to Rosselle claims. As of Monday morning, the victim had not yet recovered his stolen property.
The attackers didn’t get away with their crimes
Christopher and Mesker are facing an attempted first-degree murder charge. Mesker additionally received three conspiracy counts, felony counts of larceny of a motor vehicle, and theft after breaking into private property and a first-degree burglary charge.
Christopher, faces the same charges, including a felony count of assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury, and is being held at Gaston County Jail on a $1 million bond.
Christopher was sentenced in 1991 to a 23-year term for second-degree kidnapping and robbery with a dangerous weapon but was released in 2000, after serving only nine years. Mesker does not have a criminal record in North Carolina. The third attacker is being held on similar charges.
Sanders’ survival
When the attackers left, Sanders, who had a broken arm and leg, a hole in his hand and a deep cut on his forehead, realized he had to find help before it was too late. He managed to crawl and roll down a hill until he reached Sonya Finch’s home. The woman was woken up by a loud knock on her front door and was stunned to find Sanders battered and bloodied on her front porch.
She stated the image “still kind of haunts” her. Finch held a tourniquet to Sanders’ head after calling 911 until an ambulance came to take him to CaroMont Regional Medical Center.
“I’m just glad he’s alive” said Finch.
Once in the hospital, Sanders met Rosselle, who led the criminal investigation ever since. The captain has stated Sanders has been very helpful in providing vital information to the police.
“This was noteworthy in that you have an assault on a handicapped person, somebody coming into his house to assault him and the level of the beating that he endured,” states Rosselle. “It was noteworthy and it’s disturbing but I’m very uplifted by how quickly we resolved this and got some people charged.”
Source: WSOCTV